


Covert

by winterwhite



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Brainwashing, Character Death, Dark, JFC, M/M, Many uneasy threats of bad things, also has a lot of darkness!, does indeed have light in the darkness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-11-03
Packaged: 2018-08-20 12:56:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 14
Words: 47,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8249873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winterwhite/pseuds/winterwhite
Summary: Talon is flexible.





	1. Stop

What kinds of assholes call themselves "Talon?" It's a big mess, he gets reports that put their activity further and further out than he expected. Blackwatch can't handle this hydra on top of everything else, and he puts reports out to pass this on to someone with a little more give in their time, a little more leeway in their workload. In the meanwhile, though, trying to trim a couple heads off the hydra is his job; and that's what he's doing, right now. Gabriel leans against the side of the transport, chewing on his cigarette and trying to ignore how Ziegler is looking at him. Professional, assessing.

"I've got a lower weekly average than the rest of Blackwatch," he says finally, stubbing it out.

"It's still bad for your health!" she says cheerfully. "I can give you more pamphlets."

He had to disperse his agents for this one, send them deep into the field, isolated, alone. He spent a year training each one just for their role, the briefings and tests were exhaustive. And he's getting his payoff. He pulls out his datapad and runs an eye down the list of checks. Shana's back, he knows, he can fucking see her. Everyone's back but one blank. He looks for who it is. He knows Jesse's back, he hasn't seen him but Jesse marked his mission complete this morning. Professional as always, no sur -

Hold it, Jesse's mark is missing again. He frowns, tilting the datapad to the light, and taps the window open to the AI. _Status: McCree._

_Absent._

_Marked present earlier. Verify._

_Glitch at 1700 from number 000000. Glitch self-resolved 20 seconds ago._

He's going to raise hell with Winston later, when he's not finding out where Jesse is. He missed his check-in by ten fucking hours. He starts tapping through his datapad, alerting agents, signaling the Watchpoint, raising comms and starting flags.

"I was wondering-"

"Not now." He doesn't even look at Ziegler.

"But-"

"Shut up!" Ten hours, ten _hours_ off the map. He's getting pings, answers, but none of them are "I have something." When they send out a signal to trigger the emergency flares, McCree's vitals don't come up. Those should flag anywhere on the planet, hundreds of meters underground, underwater, in ice or fire, anywhere.

He's just gone.

**

He pulls his team out only when he's going to put them all in immediate danger.

**

They recover his melted gun and badge from the blast site: the little shelter that took a direct hit. There's no bones to recover, no DNA, plenty of matter that Mercy says was human tissue at one point. There's some material that could be a belt buckle. There's some material that could be the remnants of the fabric they use for their boots.

She doesn't tell it to Gabriel. She puts it in the report. She tells Gabriel, because he reads the report over and over and over and finally calls her to ask for any more information.

**

Jack bypasses the security on his door using Strike Commander authority two months later.

"If you don't have something new, fuck off."  

"I don't have anything new," Jack says. "Nobody does."

"So, get out."

"Gabriel-"

"You told me," Gabriel says without looking up from the map, "that you wouldn't use your authority to stop me running Blackwatch. Watching out for my men, women, teammates. I know what you're about to do, and I know why you're about to do it."

Jack crosses the room. Grabs his shoulder. Gabriel snarls and swats it off, but Jack swallows, puts his hand back, and this time Gabriel caves. Puts his face in his hands. Jack settles down by the chair and puts his arms around his shoulders.

"Fuck!" The slam of Gabriel's forearm breaks the desk, not on the reinforced top, but where it meets the sides. "Since he was seventeen, Jack! Since seven- _fucking-_ teen he's been doing whatever we say. He gave his life for my fucking mission. Your fucking mission! I don't even have a body!" Jack knows what kind of guilt he's hearing. "He deserved better from us!"

"Yeah," Jack says. "Yeah, he did."

"I should have made him apply for more leave," Gabriel says finally. "I should have kicked him off active duty more. Sent him off to get something that wasn't this _fucking_ life. There was always something I needed him to do."

"You know what he thought of you," Jack answers. His throat feels tight and scratchy. He's said or heard these words so many times, and they never get easy, never get less true. "He followed his orders, he did the job."

"This Talon bullshit." Gabriel pauses. "I feel like they were ready for us. I'm going over it and over it, and I feel like they just moved around the battlefield like they were making allowances for what we'd do. Each agent." He pauses. Brings up his datapad. Taps through an animation. "I made this out of all the data and reports we got in, satellite and agent call-ins. Look at this, it's like they come up to this mountaintop just so we'd see them in position, and as soon as we start moving in response, this way... they fuck off it without doing anything."

Jack sees it, but he sees it could have a thousand different reasons, from an equipment malfunction to an arranged signal they just stopped in to give.  He's silent. Gabriel puts the pad down.

"What'd you come in to tell me?"

"They want to hold the service," Jack says. "They asked me to talk to you."

"You're informing the next of kin," Gabriel says blankly. Jack holds him. He can feel Gabriel give up, feel his strength go slack. "Fuck. Fine. Fine. I'll be out."

**

"Don't tell me what I need to do here," he finally snarls at Jack, days later. "You're Strike Commander, remember? You got promoted, I got to stay here and keep _my_ people alive with the resources _you_ dole out, including your goddamn shit AI that doesn't even tell me when it shows one of my men is alive, and he isn't!"

"Winston doesn't know-"

"Winston doesn't have the balls to tell me whatever's going on himself. I don't want to hear what the goddamn monkey thinks. Get out, Jack, get your ass back to your side of things and let me run mine."

**

Weeks pass. Jesse's locker stands untouched. Nobody unmakes his cot.

**

The job never ends, and Gabriel stays moving. Mercy is relentlessly active, too, haunting him like she thinks he could use an angel, staying with him through every stage of grief. She puts herself in harm's way. She works her ass off helping his men through Talon's little ambushes.

Those stop feeling like Talon is giving him busy work one bright morning. The blast catches her luggage and throws it down the hill. Gabriel makes his way to the attacker, an Omnic hiding with a rocket launcher, and disassembles it without comment. No use talking to a fucking tin can.  He makes his way back to her to find her shoving mud over something.

"The hell?" he asks.

"Just prototypes I was mocking up," she says. "The shells were destroyed. There's no circuitry in them yet." He looks down. Clean white lines, more bleached than her usual gold-hinted armor, and a curl of black. "Please, Gabriel," she adds, "it's like you're looking at my underwear. A lady has to have her secrets."

"Right," he says, moving away from her insistent push.

On the way back through, when they've dropped her off and he's going back to plant more mines, he finds it: a black curve like a horn. At first, he thinks that's what it is as it skips away from his boot, an animal horn, but when he picks it up, it's made of metal. He flicks it with a finger, listening to its lightweight resonance. He looks around. He thinks he's near where they were hit, but it's hard to tell in the endless jungle with its ceaseless mud and omnipresent greenery.

He takes it with him.

**

They get a new agent assigned to the mission, and Gabriel sends everyone out on the practice grounds and goes to clear out Jesse's shit. The locker opens easily to his badge. Snack bars, a can of beer he's not supposed to have, cigarettes, extra bullets, a stack of colored paper, dress uniform (wrinkled) and boots, medals and letters of commendation. Pathetic little stash of prized goods for a young man.

What makes Gabriel sit down on the cot for a long time is when he finds his hand-written notes to Jesse, even the frankly rude or critical ones. Every fucking one, saved.

He doesn't realize he's crying until he's done stripping the cot and throwing everything into the laundry. He stays in his office, no need to let the team see it, and finally sleeps in his chair.

**

Weeks pass.

Mercy's in her lab, answering messages on her datapad. He sees her once at the window, hand over her face. The datapad is strange, doesn't look like the usual Overwatch issue. Must be a medic thing.

**

Two months later, Gerard LeCroix and his wife are murdered on their way to meet Gabriel at the next Watchpoint. It's solely so he can hand off the Talon bullshit to Gerard.

Gabriel still has the Talon bullshit. He strikes back savagely, but even with his cold precision and the rage of his soldiers, he's trying to hit a ghost.

Mercy's autopsy says that the cause of death was the bodies crushed under the tunnel's weight.

**

The Talon bullshit is killing him. Gabriel fights to stay calm. But for every report that says he had an impact, he's finding finances shifting and moving like the organization's in perfect health.

**

"Gabriel, we need to talk." Gerard and Amélie were cremated. Jack is taking him aside at the ceremony. Gabriel is too weary to even be surprised at the disruption. Ana is standing back. "Listen-"

Ana. Good. He pulls the black horn out. "You're our eyes. You ever seen something like this?"

"No - " she pauses. "Wait. It matches the gear a Talon operative was carrying, weeks ago."

He puts it away again. "Good to know."

"I've seen something else," she says, since he hasn't even looked at Jack. "I was there when they excavated the tunnel. Gerard was driving one of the special cars, reinforced. It was supposed to keep its top-secret contents protected in event of a mountain falling on them."

"That's what happened."

"Right. The bodies were still crushed, but they were in shape to see, when they dug them out." She pauses. "I saw a bullet hole."

_"What?"_

"A bullet hole. In Amélie's chest, as if the shooter were ahead of the car."

"The glass is supposed to be reinforced," he says. "No gun should just shoot straight through that."

"I know. I was waiting to see the autopsy report, but Mercy marked it high above my clearance and I did not realize it was out. Jack did not mention it to me at first. Not until I asked."

"You must have seen-" he stops. She did not see wrong. She is their sniper, with a cybernetic eye. If she saw a gunshot wound, she fucking saw one. "How would Mercy miss that?"

"The pressure's been on her like crazy," Jack says. "She's been overworking herself. The bloodstain must have come off with the clothes and she missed the entry wound."

"But you're dealing with Talon," Ana says. "We wanted you to know that they've moved a new shooter into position."

"Sure," says Gabriel. "I'll watch out. Anything else?"

"Not right now," Jack says. "We'll let-" Gabriel's already turning away. "We'll let you know."

**

Jesse calls in a month later.

He's hacked a radio to do it, gotten on their frequency, and when Gabriel hears his voice pour out of the radio, flattened and monotone, he leaps to his feet. He's already tearing off to town by the time Jesse tells them exactly where he is; Gabriel would have torn it apart brick by brick if he hadn't.

Jesse falls into his arms. He's exhausted, clearly, blinks slow like a lizard, drawl crushed and weary. He's alive. He tells of imprisonment, of an enemy unable to tell who he was or what to do with him, forgotten in a dark place until he crawled out and limped away, crept through the jungle and stowed away on a ship. It's all, step by step, as Gabriel's trained him to think or do in the past. Gabriel's too relieved to even be happy at first.

**

Jesse's different.

He's fast as ever disassembling or reassembling a gun, but when he's not being told what to do, he sits perfectly still, waiting. It's like the long time of being set aside burned something out in him. Gabriel suspects terrible things around the shadows of his captivity; there's a lot of reasons someone would hide in stillness, like _it doesn't fucking draw attention._

"He's fine," Mercy says again when Gabriel takes him by her station. "A head-to-toe scan showed nothing out of place. A bit of malnutrition, but that's already on the way to fixed up!" She pats them on the shoulder. Jesse gives her the ghost of a smile, more expression than he's given anyone but Gabriel.

"Enough," Gabriel says. "We're pulling back."

"Who?" Mercy asks in confusion.

"I haven't stepped away from my duties in years," Gabriel says. "I'm overdue some downtime. Just a month or so, but I'm taking Jesse out of this." Jesse's giving him the same look she is. "We'll step out of this, take a little breather, and come back."

"Who's going to watch Talon?" Jesse asks. "When I... when I got captured, it was because of them."

"I'm kicking that one back up the chain," Gabriel says. "It's looking much bigger than we thought. It needs more eyes on it than mine."

Mercy reaches down, takes his hand, and puts it over Jesse's. Gabriel glances at him again. Jesse is slumped, eyes staring ahead, and Gabriel puts an arm around him. It's like he threw a switch: Jesse breathes a deep sigh and molds himself into him. Gabriel cups his face, and Jesse looks up, smiling a tiny smile. Gabriel damn near kisses him.

"I'll take care of you," Mercy says. "I'll take good care of you both."


	2. Drop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not quite sure how long this will be.
> 
> Do not forget: tagged dark, please mind your comfort level! Thank you.

It's an old Blackwatch haunt they dumped for being too small. They keep it empty, and its bills stay paid out from a side fund. Because sometimes, all you need is walls, power, and water.  

He and Jesse are completely alone. No soldiers, no agents, no guards. It feels vulnerable after all the time Gabriel's spent antagonizing Talon. He takes comfort in his and Jesse's cryptic vanishing. They're tucked into a pocket of secrecy. Daily, Gabriel pulls out his worn datapad and taps around the familiar dents and dings on the screen, updating Jack on how they're doing. Jesse's been through enough that he shouldn't have to worry; they're lying low, as they have a thousand times. Jack knows where they are. Ana and Mercy are the only people who the information's been shared with until Jesse's had a chance to breathe. Nobody else needs to know.

He tries not to think about Talon, because it's too easy to ask Jesse questions, and he doesn't think Jesse can relive it many more times right now. But since Mercy's been so busy on his behalf, he can't stop thinking about what she missed. A bullet hole. In Amélie's chest. Mercy has too much experience with gunshot wounds to overlook that... small calibers could be easy to lose in the skin if there were other injuries, especially if a little time had passed, blood had time to settle out of the front of the corpse. But anything that could get through the glass would have one hell of a punch. Ana said she saw a hole. The bloodstain was Jack's idea. Ana specified a hole.

But Mercy had more time to look. Ana had just a glimpse. And she's a sniper, with how many bodies dead in just that way, by her hand? Her eye is precise, her mind might not be. Maybe the window shattered when a rock fell, and a bit of shrapnel flew inward... Gabriel lets it go. He didn't see the body, either way.

Jesse seems very, very anxious to please. It bothers Gabriel. They can be sitting quietly, reading, and he'll notice Jesse's attention is on him. He puts it down to having been a prisoner for so long. He tries to draw Jesse out of it. Reaches out, touches him, accepts him when Jesse comes close. After what he felt when he thought Jesse was dead... well, he doesn't have any doubts about what he wants now.

Maybe Jesse does. It's hard to say. Jesse's just gotten out of a survival situation, and he should have a chance to get back to normal before he's asked what he wants. So Gabriel just gives him whatever peace he can scratch up. Gives him space. Watches Jesse orient on him, like a compass finding north.

Two calmly certain women, women he's trusted for years, contradicting each other.

"What's wrong?" Jesse has oriented on him.

"Just a puzzle." 

Jesse gets up, coming over. Gabriel watches him, reading the few small shifts on Jesse's face. It seems to him there used to be more, like Jesse's thoughts play out less fluidly over his face. Maybe it's just him. "Talon?"

"Yeah."

"Don't like it," Jesse says, settling down beside him, draping over his chest. Gabriel puts his arms around him, automatically. "Don't like thinking about it."

"You're safe now."

Jesse kisses him.

This is new. This is - this isn't new at all, it's Jesse as he's always known him. The Jesse he lost, the Jesse he mourned: impulsive, demanding, expressive. Suddenly fiery again, suddenly fierce. Jesse's knee slides over his thighs, Jesse settles into his lap. It's confusing but perfect. Jesse's hands slide into his clothes like he's known he could do this for months, rip cloth like he's offended that Gabriel didn't already take care of that for him. Gabriel, who reads those around him like a book, was completely off-guard and is still trying to catch up.

Jesse doesn't wait for him. Jesse takes what he wants without conversation, without delay. It's not at all like Gabriel pictured it. Jesse barely makes eye contact, more interested in moving with hunger and... anger, there's something angry in every move. Gabriel's left gasping, Jesse falling asleep on his chest, still messy.

Gabriel has no complaints, but he's confused; he predicted Jesse as being... considerate? Empathetic? Attuned? He's not sure, but that felt like putting his foot down expecting a step and finding flat floor; not falling, but not balanced. He lifts them both up out of the chair and drops Jesse in bed, goes to clean up. Jesse comes and finds him, dragging him insistently to bed. There, he shoves Gabriel until he's curled on his side, settles against him in a ball. He won't speak. There's something animal in it.

Gabriel strokes his hair until he falls asleep.

Jesse's gone in the morning. Gabriel goes outside and finds him standing on the hill, staring towards the sea.

They spend the day on the beach. It's empty and quiet, the sky low over the rolling waves. Gabriel wades and fishes. Jesse swims, restless. When he's resting, Gabriel talks to him. He still feels imbalanced when he recalls Jesse's ferocity. He tells him how he felt, how he'll always feel. Jesse... listens. It throws Gabriel. He was expecting more.

 "Jesse," he says, finally. He doesn't often get to let his voice go like this, kind of enjoys letting Jesse hear it. "I don't want to command you. Not if you-" 

 Jesse looks up, smiling slowly. "I get it," he says. "Yeah. Whatever you want." 

 Which is not what he expected, at all. But Jesse's looking at him like it's the most reasonable thing in the world. And it is. But he was expecting more... he doesn't know, Jesse built his life around Blackwatch. Or maybe just Gabriel, maybe Reyes had fucked up and it was about him all along. He would think Jesse didn't care at all, if it weren't for that gentle face, if it weren't for the way Jesse steps into his space like he belongs.

 Gabriel kisses him. There's so much he's been missing. All the big picture swirling around him, all the pieces, and he can only pick out so many at a time. 

 (Why would Mercy not want him to see her armor? He sees it all the goddamn time. He's seen her in her underwear, come to think of it, darting out of her room climbing into her coat when the emergency was too serious to wait.  Sure, he averted his eyes, but his point is: it doesn't fucking matter if that's an armor shell or a bra, they always have bigger problems.)

 In his memory, those lines are so fucking familiar. There's something he's missing, there's an easy connection. His mind shifts to something else. He lost Jesse because of a window they had from technology.

 A bug.

 What if they have help in Overwatch?

 He decides that he's seriously questioning if a monkey from the Moon somehow managed to get ties to a bunch of terrorists. It wasn't the kind of thing you just landed in, it was the kind of thing you meshed yourself into slowly. Winston seems sincere in wanting to help, he'd gotten Lena fixed in time again. Why would he be helping Talon? Why would anyone? Talon's a bunch of murderers with a loose, anti-Omnic agenda.  

The next fish he catches is large enough to keep. He calls Jesse to see if he wants lunch. Jesse pads back to the little hideout with him. Gabriel cleans and cooks fish. Jesse says very little, hair stiff with saltwater and eyes a thousand miles away. They eat in silence, Gabriel waiting to see if Jesse comes out of it on his won. Gabriel comes up behind him while he's doing dishes. He's not sure what will be too aggressive, so he just moves up and waits for Jesse to give him a sign. Jesse ignores him until he's done with his dish. Then he puts it down on the counter, turns, and fucking attacks. His lips on Gabriel's assure him Jesse isn't just trying to hurt him. His hands are like iron, muscles tense.

"Hey." Gabriel can hear his own voice get steely. He lifts Jesse up and puts his ass on the counter. "Slow down. What's going on?"

Jesse blinks at him owlishly. It's like the words have pulled him out of something, or back together, and he gives a long, slow shudder. Then he collapses against Gabriel like his strings were cut. Gabriel catches him.

"Why didn't you find me?" he mutters, defeated, into Gabriel's ear.

" We waited. We looked. We thought you were dead."

"Wasn't gonna just die on you." Jesse's muscles are locking again, clinging to him.

"I kept looking for a sign," Gabriel murmurs into his hair. But: why would they want him to think Jesse was dead? Why would they care about buying time from a relentless search?

Because they'd wanted Jesse. They'd planned to get him. Then they got him. Then, they parked him in a dark hole until he escaped. That didn't hang together; Talon had everything they wanted. Did they let him get away? Why?

"Jesse," he says, "what do you remember about being captured?"

"It's dark," Jesse says immediately. "Dirty. The jungle comes in through the cracks. It's loud. The bugs won't stop." It's what he's said before.

"You didn't see any faces?"

"Not that I could remember anythin' about, later." It's what he's said before.

Gabriel takes it on a different tack. Sense memories can be powerful. He's avoided asking before, but now it seems like a good time to push. "Think about it. What do you smell?" Jesse's silent. Curled in tight against Gabriel. "Jesse?" Jesse is shaking - no, trembling, fine uncontrollable shivers. "Jesse?"

"Antiseptic," Jesse whispers. "Everywhere."

Gabriel walks them back across the kitchen and settles down with a door on his right, door on his left, window across from him, Jesse shaking in his arms.

He gets out his datapad and drops it by his side, behind Jesse's head. Taps out a message: _Jack: Talon, human experimentation. Connections?_

The reply: _Between them and their associates, yes. Them alone, no. Anything to narrow that down?_

_Jesse reported typical jungle shit. Said he was kept there. Then antiseptic smell. Mismatch._

It takes a moment before it appears: _I'm looking into it._

"Anything else, when you smell it?"

"White." Jesse's voice is small and far away. "White light."

Gabriel feels something on his chest. Reaches down, touches Jesse's face. Tears. He folds around him. "What else?" Jesse shakes his head. "If you've got anything, I need it."

"That's all I remember." Jesse's voice is slurring, like he's been drugged, and Gabriel lifts his chin and looks at his face. Jesse smiles at him, tentatively, and settles against his body. He falls asleep fast, the deep slumber of healing injury.

**

"I don't understand," Mercy says. Her hands are still on the table. Jesse's asleep on the couch. It's getting dark outside. "The scans all showed nothing. I used the same equipment I always do."

"There's no chance you could be missing something?"

"I can have him admitted to a local hospital," she says. "Their equipment might not be as effective as mine, but there's no harm in a second opinion." She reaches out and lays a hand over his. "I admit, it's good to have another professional look in, when you're this close to your patients." Something he has been turning over in the back of his mind settles again. Whispers and hints slither down, still, to nest.

His datapad buzzes. He flips it up to his hand. "Hang on, I think this is Jack."

"Did you invite him over?"

"No. He's got a lot-"

 _Winston says Jesse's signal wasn't a bug, it was a hack_ , the message says. _He's still checking system integrity. Relocate. Lie low._

This is _it_ Gabriel knows by the jangle of adrenaline in his spine. He's isolated himself and Jesse, and managed to get Mercy out here too. He's had his datapad with him the whole time. If Talon's still got a plan for Jesse, if they got any access to his datapad, this is when they'll move. Gabriel gets up. "Get in the car." He taps: _Will report._ Then he moves.

At his tone, Mercy moves. She doesn't obey. She goes to stand by Jesse, her medical bag in her hands. He grabs the bag they'll need, scoops up Jesse in his arms, and hauls him into the garage. Mercy moves with them. Jesse wakes up and struggles to stand. Gabriel points him into the backseat and hands him the bag. "Go back to sleep." Jesse's obedience is long habit. Gabriel gently shuts the soundproof panels between front and back. Then he takes off. When he drives, he doesn't see anything unusual, and the scanners in the cars get nothing.

"Where's your datapad?" He holds a hand out. She passes it over. He taps a few codes in his and drops both into a curbside incinerator as they pass it. He waits only to see fire flare, to smell the melt, and proceeds to the drop site. An idea occurs to him. "What about your second one?"

"I don't have a second datapad."

"Your medic one. I've seen you using a different one."

"Oh!" She nods. "I leave that at the infirmary."

"Okay. Clear it when you get back. Get a new one from Winston. Nobody else."  

"Why would I get a datapad from anyone else?" she asks.

He glances sideways. She just looks curious and concerned. She's been with them all this time. But he doesn't know if Jack has cleared her to know this one. "Just don't go picking one up from the quartermaster. Winston, or nobody."

She nods. Her lips are tight, but she relaxes her face, obviously trying not to concern him. He appreciates  it. "Where are you going now?"

"I have a different safehouse. Private. Hidden. It's a few hours away."

"Is Jack meeting you there?"

"He doesn't know it, I don't have a way to arrange it. I'll contact him after the new devices drop." The datapads the agents carried with them were designed with the possibility of the agent being captured. Jack would have issued the protocol for a breach like this, locked Blackwatch the fuck down until they know how bad the hack was. He notices he's speeding and slows. Winston's assessing, so the damage control is underway, getting them killed won't help. He glances sideways. "Do you have any other comms synced with Overwatch?"

"No," she says slowly. "Gabriel, please, what's going on?"

She knows enough to panic if he doesn't tell her. "Someone hacked Jesse's datapad. Logged in, and flag him as returned."

"Couldn't they just have knocked him out and taken it?"

He reminds himself that Mercy is not a field agent. "There's no 'I'm in' button to push. You have to enter the right codes. Jesse wouldn't have given those up. Even if they had some kind of truth serum, they wouldn't know the questions to go through the process." He glances over his shoulder. The delivery truck he spotted is already turning off. "However they got in, if they were able to access one, they had a chance to check out Winston's firewall. That's at the least. We can't risk anything else."

She nods grimly. Glances in the backseat. "What will you do now?"

"Well, this sure fucks my retirement plans." He sighs. "Jesse's out of Blackwatch."

"But you care-"

"I know. But if you get in a relationship with your subordinate, what happens? Order breaks down. So. He's out. Jack can take him on, if he wants, or he can get a job outside." He rubs his cheekbone. "I have to get this under control, find out how deep it runs, clean it up. Vacation's over."

"It was Talon," Mercy says with soft certainty.  

He lets out a long breath. He shouldn't tell her too much. It will panic her. He glances at the partition. Sealed. Jesse can't hear them. "We have a lot of enemies."

"If they hacked Jesse's datapad, it happened while..."

He nods. "I know. I've got it, Angela. We won't go in blind, we won't go in careless. We'll do this right." He glances out the windows again. "You might as well get some sleep. We'll be a little while on the road."

She obliges him and pretends to sleep, too wound up to actually drift away. He's too busy thinking, going forward and back over all his agent's roles and missions, trying to rework his strategies after the possibility of discovery.

Mercy sits up, eventually, and yawns hugely. Looks out the window. "Where are we?"

"Still on the coast," he says. "We'll check in with Jack at the drop, then proceed to the safe-"

Jesse taps on the partition. Gabriel pulls over. Hell, he's been driving long enough that a little breather will be fine. He gets a cigar out. Mercy give him a narrow look. He ignores her, lights it, offers it to Jesse. Jesse shakes his head. Gabriel blinks, but doesn't offer again. He glances up at a sound on the wind. Something in the distance, high up. Engine? He holds a hand out to signal them still. Neither of them move. He listens carefully. No, whatever it was, it's passed in the distance. They're fine.

"Sorry to drag you into this, Mercy," he says, exhaling smoke into the wind.

"It's fine," she says. "It's just bad timing." She hands her medical bag to Jesse. "Could you put that in the backseat, Jesse?"  

"Sure," he says. They jostle the catch passing it from hand to hand, and Jesse swears, catching something as it starts to slide out.

Mercy's lip quirks. "Cowboy," she says, shaking her head, steadying the bag in a forgiving way. "What time is it?"

Gabriel leans down and glances in the car. "It's about-"

 His chin hits the top of the car door, air slammed out of him. There's a spike of pain down his ribs, coming from just below his shoulderblade, like he's been shot. There's an iron grip on his other shoulder. He turns, throwing off the attacked, raising a fist, and stops. Jesse. Jesse, standing with some kind of white... stick, but pointed, sharp, and bloody... in his hand. His face, his eyes, are completely blank. The dullness in Gabriel's side has turned to spreading needles and burning. Poison, he's poisoned.

 _Nobody knows we're here_ his brain points out.

"Mercy," he snaps. "Get back."

Jesse strikes again. Gabriel moves to block, gets there in time, but the movement turns out to be pure bluff. Jesse turns his hand and oh: the other end is a taser. Gabriel hits the dirt. Jesse follows him down. Gabriel's spasming too hard to block. The strike tears into his shoulder, savage and precise. That arm's not going to be useful now. Gabriel doesn't want to do it, but he can't let Jesse just shut him down. A sweep of his other arm throws Jesse, sending him rolling over the rocks. Gabriel gets up, leaning against the car.

"Get in the car!" Gabriel snaps at Mercy, who hasn't moved a muscle. "Go!" He hears her jump for the bag. Shit. She wants to save Jesse. He gets in between them. Jesse's getting up, looking for his weapon. Gabriel jumps towards it, gets there first, and stomps it. It shatters, but the motion staggers him. His guts are crawling, the burning's spreading fiercely down his back into his arms and legs. SEP should have given him a resistance to almost everything. What is this? How did they know it would work? Where did he get it? They're all important, but all he sees is Jesse's face, still and calm under trickling blood.

"Hold him," Mercy commands tersely. "I need to get the needle in."

Jesse has been closing with the same regular glide that Gabriel has seen coming at him on the practice yard, moving to cover his back, thousands of times. He draws his fist up. He holds the punch. This isn't quite like any battle he's fought before. Not against Omnics, not against soldiers. Jesse is just... blank. Gabriel would be fighting a stranger, if he didn't know Gabriel so well that he blocks the first hit. Gabriel pulls it so he doesn't break Jesse's arm. Mercy's right there, they can stop him without hurting him. 

"Jesse," he says. "Please."

Jesse stops still, staring.

"It's me," he says. "I love-"

The sting and the feeling of his knees giving out come right on top of each other. This time, he knows exactly what happened. He whirls with the last of his strength, throwing his arm out. The impact knocks Mercy's head against the side of the car and drops her on the seat. Jesse catches him as he starts to fall. He reaches out. He recognises the needle as soon as his fingers touch it. Yanking the dart out will empty the contents as he does, so he slaps it sideways hard enough to break the vial and splatter the rest of the drug down his back. He doesn't know how much is already in his blood.

"Gabriel!" she says reproachfully.

"What was that?" he says, since  _fuck you_ is a luxury. He looks up, but Jesse's face is still a stranger's. His eyes are on Mercy now. Mercy brings her fingers away from her head, swears, digs in her bag and injects herself with biotics. There are figures moving at the edge of his vision. He forces himself to focus. Armored figures, coming up the road.

"Why?" he asks Mercy.

"I'm sorry," she says. "You didn't go  far enough. The Crisis isn't finished. We need you." She sounds just like always, eyes wide, blue, kind. Was she taken like Jesse? He doesn't think so, can't think of any time she's been gone. He can't say for sure anymore. He thought he was on top of everything, and he missed - all of this. He's certain only that he's out of time. Mercy knew the chemicals to shut off his SEP gains; he doesn't think he can stand, he's weakening by the second. 

 "Jesse," he says. "Run."

Jesse's head cocks in puzzlement, and his fingers trace over Gabriel's lips. "Run where?" he asks. Without waiting for an answer, he grabs Gabriel's throat and squeezes. Gabriel grabs his wrist and wrenches, but Mercy's already there with a new needle.

Gabriel can feel Jesse's hand lift, sucks air, but everything is much darker than it should be. He's never sure if he's caught, or if Jesse lets him hit the ground.


	3. Roll

"Sorry it took me so long," Mercy says into her spare datapad. "I was in the middle of an operation."

Jack barges ahead. "You were going to see Gabriel today, weren't you? Where are you? Your datapad went offline yesterday morning."

"I had to take it through security," she says. "I forgot to put it back on. I'm in the air now, coming back."

"Mercy," Jack says. "Please. I need you at your best."

"I'm sorry. I was hoping the peace and quiet would last long enough for me to take care of everything I've been putting off."

"I'll see you when you get here. Travel fast, travel safe." Jack hangs up. Mercy shakes her head. She can remember her first patient on her first charity mission: a little boy, with poor parents that had to travel far to have their child cared for when he broke his leg. They got him to an incompetent doctor before turning for home. By the time Mercy came along, it had already fully healed, and badly. She can still remember the mother's tears when she explained that they would have to start over.

It never gets easier.

She realizes the loudspeakers have been talking only when she hears "if you are a doctor, please touch the call button" from overhead. Mercy slaps it, jumps to her feet, lifting her bag to her shoulder. The drugs that she set aside for Reyes have been used and the vials purged. She won't need them again. The datapad Talon uses to contact her is tucked away in the bag's sealed bottom compartment. Formerly, it nested between her Overwatch datapad and her spare Overwatch datapad. 

"Excuse me," she says, brushing past the Omnic that's also getting up. There are several on the plane. They sit quietly, waiting. They shouldn't be here; they aren't human, they're mimics. The steward recognises Angela and steps back, motioning for her to follow. Her patient is an elderly man. His prosthetic hand is clenched in pain. She recognises the make: a veteran's arm taken from Bastion parts fresh off the battlefield.

Battlefield medicine carried them all away from replacing flesh with flesh, cloning and reattaching, melding instead of replacing. The Omnics had taken cloning facilities and hospitals as the strategic equivalent of Omniums, had prioritized them as targets. When Angela's parents were killed, cloning research had also been lost. Humanity had no choice but to take the machines' parts onto their own bodies. Like they have no choice but to let the Omnics live among them.

Mercy pushes the thought aside, and smiles, crouching. Bedside manner is important in getting them calm enough for an assessment. She can't let anything show, as usual. "What's the trouble, sir?"

**

Jack starts by just glancing at his datapad.

He continues by leaving a message in Gabriel's mailbox: things to catch up with later, that he shouldn't forget.

The next morning, he's pacing.

That afternoon, he's at the drop site personally, just waiting.

That evening, he leaves three agents and goes looking for places Gabriel mentioned.

The next morning, he's at the safehouse, tearing it up looking for clues. Agents are combing it with him, satellites are hunting over the area. Ana's back in Gabe's quarters ( _sorry Gabe_ ) searching for a list of Gabriel's getaways that he might have left for them. Anything he might have left for them.

Nothing. It's like they just stepped into nowhere.

Talon has, by and large, melted away like the last of a spring snow. Active agents have withdrawn or are sleeping. Leaders have diminished their forces to nothing and drifted to different causes after Gabriel's offensives. Jack takes Overwatch and raids the last of their known cells, but they're too disconnected from the rest of Talon to lead him back up the trail.

Ana, Mercy, and Reinhardt close ranks around Jack. They brainstorm ideas to search. They look everywhere, _everywhere_ they can think of. Jack slumps with Ana's arms around his shoulders and tells Winston to suspend Reyes' security clearance with Jesse's.

Nothing.

Days. Weeks. The world keeps turning, alerts keep flashing, situations ageing towards critical. Jack is carrying the leadership alone for the first time. Overwatch swings every time there's a breath of Talon, and hits mist or scatters small, dead targets. 

A month.

Jack holds Mercy, tears dripping into her hair, and gives Winston the order to shut off Gabriel's security clearance.  Jesse's blips out with it. "He's not dead," Jack says into the top of Mercy's head. "We've been here before. Wherever they are, they're not dead." 

**

He feels like the paper gown they've wrapped him in. He can't turn his head, can follow his arm down to the machine it's trapped in. There's sensors running up and down both arms, watching for a spike of muscle activity that a human couldn't muster (he's heard the sensors going off by now well enough to know which drug they'll respond with.) There's a series of needles taped into his vein.

He's not sure if they're using nanites or lasers, but he knows they're doing _something_ to his brain. He can feel his memories eroding, feel his ability to concentrate come and go.

The air fans over his skin (hypersensitive, they dropped a pain enhancer on him the last time he tried to pull the needles out.) He knows which door that was.

He feels stupid hope rising in his chest when he sees familiar, bare feet, and crushes it down as best he can. Jesse's fingers slide under his jaw. Trace up to the bulge of the mouthguard (half there to preserve his teeth, half there to stop him trying to bite them) under his lip.

"Hate seeing you like this, boss," he murmurs, grabbing it and sliding it out. Gabriel could lock his teeth on it, fight conversation, but...

"That's because it's shit. What do you want?" Jesse's wearing some kind of green body... well, it's not body paint, but only by about a millimeter's thickness. His hands and feet are bare, the neckline heads down towards his navel. Gabriel's eyes trace the stretch of the material. It's thinner, and a different color over his thighs. He looks up disbelievingly. Jesse's pulling some kind of heavy, multipaneled helmet off his head. "That looks ridiculous."

"Green's not my color."  Jesse steps in close enough to breathe his air, other hand hanging for a moment before it settles down on the back of Gabriel's neck.

"That outfit's going to get you killed," Gabriel says. "Your armor's all on your head. Good start. Now just cover the rest of the body." Jesse's hand rubs a little circle by his jaw. It's the first time Gabriel's been touched by hands that aren't a doctor's. He has to clench his fists to keep from relaxing. "If you can." He knows Jesse can't. He wears what he's given. "Get out," he adds.

"Now-"

"Get. Out."

Jesse's hands come off his skin. He rocks a half-step back. "Didn't get to see you before," Jesse says, disappointment in his eyes.

He knows they're mapping his brain. Tracking the changes that happen when Jesse touches him, when he looks at Jesse, when he listens to his voice. They're tapping and turning, looking for something they can use to break him. "Get out."

Jesse caves. Slumps forward, leaning into him, and Gabriel gets his strength together and jerks his head. With the enhancers, it hurts like he headbutt a wall, full force, when his forehead hits Jesse's temple. Jesse just takes it, rocking back without complaint. Leans again. Gabriel takes a deep breath. "They're watching this. They told you what to say. Told you what to do. Told you how to act. They're recording every moment of this. They'll analyze it for weeks. I'm not biting, Jesse. Get out."

Jesse's eyes squint like Gabriel just hit him harder. He offers back the mouth guard, which Gabriel doesn't take. Then he turns and leaves.

Gabriel doesn't get to bite a scientist again, because they knock him out before they get close.

They've learned.

**

"It's been six weeks," Mercy says.

"Gabriel asked about human experimentation." He's read the last exchanges to them all over and over. "They took him for research. Maybe they're trying to recreate the SEP." He snorts. "Because that was such a success. They needed a war to cover the attrition rate, and even then, the late failures damn near publicized the whole thing, with the messy containment issues."

"It's self-destructive, for terrorists," Reinhardt says. "Unless you think they're preparing to drop some of it into a water supply and try to make super-durable insane people."

"Not their style," says Ana. "They miss no chance to engage Omnics. Humans seem to bore them."

"He's still out there, alive," Jack continues to Mercy. "Maybe even Jesse." Mercy says nothing. Jack looks in her eyes, and his face changes as he reads her. Ana puts a hand on his shoulder. Reinhardt gets up.

"Where are you going?" Mercy asks.

"Lead in Malaysia," Jack answers.

"Can I come?" Mercy asks. "I would prefer to be busy right now."

"I think you had better stay here," says Reinhardt. "Perhaps..." he glances at Jack. "Perhaps it's better that way. I will be careful."

Mercy nods. Watching them suffer is agonizing. They've always been good to her, always tried to be kind, although their foolish violence followed by its sudden, too-short stop are infuriating. They could have _done it_ by now, with no need for her to bloody her hands. She presses her palms together.

Jesse was a natural successor to Reyes, and at one point, she'd been planning to help usher him into the vacuum left behind. But sixteen months ago, she'd been looking over when Reyes' attention dropped carelessly on Jesse, and she'd seen the minute changes in his face and thought: _oh. Of course._ She'd reported it immediately. When she'd done Amélie's workup, a scan had revealed genetic properties compatible with mostly-theoretical pliability treatments. More than McCree had flagged for. But between Gabriel or Gérard, there was no contest.

She can still remember standing over the little boy's unconscious body, bone saw in hand. No hesitation possible, with only a limited amount of safe anaesthetic; every move planned ahead of time, every slice, and the steady, purposeful descent of the bone saw. 

She can still remember her relief when Jesse's eyes opened and he finally looked at her with hope.

Part of her wants to give Jesse some of the serums she's used on herself, to see how they worked on someone else. Just because she's going to have to ask more of him. He's already lost everything to their certainty of him. If he's hurt, if she has to amputate, it will be good to have it grow back over time, rather than have to graft machines to his body. But she's not quite sure of the long-term effects on herself yet. She didn't want to experiment on him; won't, now that she's done what she had to. 

The door slides open, and Genji walks in. Mercy catches herself gauging the swing of his shoulders, the placement of his feet. Genji is very stoical, and still tries to be self-reliant, as if his body can still heal itself now. (It has a tiny bit of that capacity, but since the nanite technology is still in its early stages, Mercy has preferred not to mention it.)  She does see some stiffness, but she thinks it is his stress as he tries to influence and navigate Blackwatch.

"Welcome back," says Ana.

"Thank you." He looks around. Mercy gives him a smile. He tips a hand in salute. The points in the back of his hands glint. Mercy still wishes that she'd been able to give him something back, something more like what he had. There's still enough flesh, skin, blood under the armor for her to be able to clone and rebuild, if only the Omnics hadn't targeted the research in the war. Instead, she'd made him into a weapon. Taken a man, and given him the frame of an Omnic. He has peace with it. She does not.

"You're here to report more trouble in Blackwatch," Mercy says to distract herself.

"There must be a promotion quickly," Genji says. "They are not holding."

"I've got it," Jack says wearily. Gabriel held Blackwatch together by guile and willpower. Without him, it's splintering fast and hard. The progress they've made on Talon is outdating. They probably haven't shared their espionage effectively. Mercy is much safer than before. She glances between Jack, Ana, and Reinhardt. Neural reprogramming is still a mystery. Gabriel is going to have to teach them a thousand things before it's ready for more... general use.

She wants to save humanity, but she wants to spare her friends.

**

_I am Gabriel Reyes. I command Blackwatch. Jack Morrison is my friend. He is looking for me. Angela Ziegler is a traitor. Jesse McCree is a traitor. I will see them both. I will not sympathize._

He still has that. He's lost entire swaths of time. He can replay parts of the Omnic Crisis, but he hits blanks. He can see faces, but not place them, not give them names. Blackwatch last year is gone. There is a bit of a comfort, because he knows this is Talon, he knows he was studying them, and he knows they ask him questions about that when he is at his lowest. If they have rendered him unable to answer, he'll take it. It is not much of a comfort, because he can't remember what he told Mercy but he knows she was often by his side.

They haven't unplugged him from the machines. They knock him out, they revive him. When it's just discomfort, he sleeps. The rest of the time, it's pain.

He hears the pad of bare feet. He closes his eyes. Jesse there when he opens them. He's clean-shaven. His hair is smooth and gelled, pulled back into a ponytail. His hands are as gentle as ever as he takes the mouthguard. There's a grace to his movements that wasn't there before as he moves to the small, side table to put it away. They've crushed the swagger out of him, and this new fluidity has swirled in behind. Reyes wonders what he'd look like if they unhooked him now. Wonders if he's actually diminished, chiseled down like he feels.

He doesn't say anything. Jesse moves to look at him. Fingers trail gently over the tape on his arm. Jesse puts a long stroke of his thumb over the growth of Gabriel's beard. Warm and kind touches.

"Stop," Gabriel says.

Jesse lifts his hands. "It hurts," he says. "I know." He sounds sincere, but Gabriel imagines Jesse where he is now, imagines him hearing _you are in love with him, you will maintain his trust_ in a dry, factual tone until it's part of Jesse. Imagines them remaking him into nothing but bait. Did Jesse love him before Talon took him? Gabriel thinks so, but it was never spoken. High in Blackwatch, they knew a touch could ruin each other's lives.

Never spoken. Suspect now, because there are many kinds of love. Jesse was full-hearted.

The catsuit has a bronze shimmer to it, this time. Gabriel curls his lip. He's said nothing but name and rank for... however long it's been... but it just slips out. "Tell me you wear that under your _real_ armor."

Jesse answers as easily as if they've been bantering for days. "They took the chestplate away. Ain't seen it since." Gabriel looks into his brown eyes. Reminds himself that Jesse's gone away, not himself. "You know, you're holdin' out a lot longer than I did." His fingers fan like he wants to touch, although he doesn't move closer. "Not surprised."

"Experience counts," he says wearily. He can't blame Jesse. _I will not sympathize._ He should blame Jesse.

"Wish you wouldn't."

"I have a duty to resist," Gabriel points out. "You have a duty to aid me, or at the basic fucking _minimum_ , not help them. Get out." It's will to resist, it's discipline, and it's experience. He wonders how long Jesse really held out.

Jesse moves against him, curled inward against his body. Gabriel remembers Jesse falling asleep, wounded, the same way. He wonders how long ago that was. He turns his face away. "They said it would be different when you were here," Jesse says.

"They were wrong."

"They said it would be okay."

 "They were wrong."

There's a little silence. "I can't do this alone," Jesse whispers.

"Get out." Jesse makes a wounded sound. Doesn't move. "I don't remember accepting your resignation," Gabriel says. "I don't remember hearing it. I remember you stabbing me in the back. Don't ask me for shit. Get out."

_I will not sympathize_ he thinks as Jesse walks away, slower than when he came in. They took Jesse because they saw an in. It worked. If he wants them to use Jesse to break him, all he has to do is be kind.

They see another in. He's not sure if they got it from his nerves as he chased Jesse away, or his reactions as he endured the conversation. Either way, they don't put the mouthguard back. They show him video feed.  Jesse lies still and quiet, eyes open, body wrapped in paper like the gown on Gabriel now.

Gabriel flattens his breathing, controls his thoughts, and moves his focus out to the big picture. He watches what they're using, the timing of it, what they look for when they turn their heads to check monitors and dials. It's not the hands-on torture he's seen before, it's not the cold, steady breaking of psyops. It's science, it's medicine, it's sterile and clean, it's glazed eyes and short breathing. There's no visible machinery like the one hooked up to the back of his skull. They're doing something to Jesse that they haven't done to him. He finds that interesting. It suggests _prototype_. It suggests _flaw_.

"I don't approve," Mercy's voice says, and he feels cold rage.

"It's working," another woman's voice points out. He can't see either of them outside Jesse's circle of light. He determines as much as he can (slightly older, native Italian speaker, he thinks?)

"It's the same technology we want to leave behind. We're using machines."

"Nanomachines and Omnics are worlds apart. These don't mimic humanity at all."

"You could argue, since they're clustered in his brain right now, that they are temporarily-"

"It's working," the other woman repeats. "He's gone into this state four times. The conditioning stays when we bring him out. I'll filter the nanomachines out of his blood if you insist." He notes that Mercy is a leader, an authority. A leader in Talon, or just among its researchers? "Your idea seems unnecessary. Much more lengthy."

He can hear the sharp inbreath Mercy makes when she's about to counter the argument, and he _really_ wants to hear her say why the other woman's plan is inadequate. But the feed, of course, cuts away to a different session. This one has the expected blood. Reyes pins his focus as far out as he can, and witnesses.

It doesn't give him what he's looking for, but it still pays off. He picks up one thing they didn't mean to give him: a side mention of the death of one of their researchers, a setback to their project. Reyes' team identified and assassinated the man in a good five month's work. He doesn't turn his head and smile. It's frivolous. The sensors on him have picked up his glee.

They show him the time Jesse whispers his name, over and over, staring into the darkness, green-lit on the screen. They show him the breakdown when Jesse decides he's been forgotten. They don't show him Jesse's preparation for his mission. He gets no hints as to what's real in Jesse's head, and what's their artifice. He decides he wouldn't trust it if they did; they have weeks' worth of things to edit to create whatever impression they like, and after their little slip, he's sure they're choosing much more carefully.

By the time it's over, he's exhausted, his face is stiff from holding no expression, and his shoulders ache from bracing himself to stillness. He doesn't think that he gave them anything new. They don't put the mouthguard back in after they're done showing him videos. When he wakes up, Mercy is there.

Since he can speak: "You look ridiculous." She does. This is the armor he found the horn of. It is purple and white and devil-themed. He does not roll his eyes. It is not worth the effort.

She ignores him, anyway. She is looking over the machine instead with professional detachment. "Overkill," she says disdainfully, flicking open the chamber that contains the little vial of pain enhancer and taking it out. She puts the vial back in the cabinet (he notes that it has not been destroyed.)

"I think we're both too old for charades," he says. She glances at his face. Reaches out, not to touch him but to move one of the indicators taped to his chest. He feels a muscle jump in his jaw. "Ziegler."

She sighs. "Yes, Gabriel."

"Reyes, to you." She just gives him an inscrutable, sideways look. "Why?"

"Do you remember when Torbjorn released his plans for the biotic rifle? Do you remember what I said about a slippery slope?"

He can't remember. He doesn't see a need to give that away. "We were on the way to capturing and brainwashing our friends?" He shrugs as far as he can. "Yeah. That was it."

"I said that my technology to save human lives was being inevitably perverted into a weapon." She sighs, slumping. "Gabriel, I know. I know the price for you. You let yourself be a weapon once. We need that again. I have no choice. We need a better soldier. We need you. We need more than we had if we're going to accomplish our aims."

It's so hard to focus. Worse, with her weakly apologetic air. "What. Are. They."

"To finish the Omnic crisis and reclaim good technology and progress. To turn away from always replacing people with mechanical parts, to stop thinking of healing as mere repair and find rejuvenation instead. To conquer death."  

It's hard to fight. He is who he is; he fights. "And you know this is bullshit. Otherwise, you would have tried to talk me into it."

"I know that you are at peace with the breaks in the world. You accept it, with its wrongs. You use them, you perpetuate them-"

"This lecture is coming from a woman in a light-up devil costume." He's not just antagonizing her. He's still strapped to a machine and she is standing by levers that are connected to pads over places _in his brain_. But he has to keep his own will to fight alive. If he has to fan the flames, he'll do that. "The Omnic Crisis is ended."

"The Omnics remain. The ways they have changed our thinking remain." Her fingers lift towards his face. They turn back towards hers, tracing lines over her cheekbone in a mirror of his scars. "Did you notice that we never went back to plastic surgery? Not like it was developing. We grow animal tissue for our food, but we won't grow arms back for our soldiers. We're used to seeing Omnic limbs. We don't need to go to the expense of personalizing those." She steps back. "The more we interact with them, the more children are raised to have their parody of humanity in the world... the less chance we will reclaim ourselves. Omniums exist in the world. Inevitably, they will reactivate. Or a god program will find a way to boost its signal, and every Omnic in the world will rise."

"Or you'll make those happen." He keeps his voice hard. "You're just another fucking hypocrite-"

"I joined Talon the moment I saw that weapon," her voice lifts over his. "They'd been courting me for years, and no, I never did mention it. I thought they were terrorists. I never did think that they were entirely wrong, not after I lost my parents, like so many others. But when I saw those blueprints, I realized that until we rise above machines, until we rise above death, everything that should be good is just going to get dragged down and used to perpetuate our suffering."

At least what she's saying is enough to rouse his weakened anger. "How in fuck are you planning to rise above death?"

She reaches up to her armor and flicks off the energy source. The purple glow dims, and her wings rustle closed.  She reaches into the cabinet and takes a scalpel, dragging it over her hand. She holds her hand out, wiping a bit of gauze over the cut. Once. Twice. The cut's gone. He looks up again.

"It's not my armor," she says. "It's a serum I gave myself. It won't heal large wounds, but it's good for slow healing over time, and small things go away in moments. I don't think I'm getting any older... although I'm not testing it on anyone else for another two decades, at least." She shrugs. "And yes, I am working on the problem of death."

"With serums."

"With technology."

He pushes himself forward as far as he can, leaning towards her. "Jesse is still hurting," he tells her. "You haven't solved _shit._ They will never stop searching for me. What's the plan for Ana? Jack? Are you mindfucking all of us to free humanity?" Her gaze shifts. She seems to find it painful to look at him. Good.

"Not everyone is a suitable candidate," she says. "I work with what I have. I know, I know it hurts." She reaches up to his chest, fingertips light. "It will stop hurting the moment you let it."

"What is it?"

"We're remapping your brain." She gives him a tiny shrug. "I'm sure you've noticed damage to your memory. It's unavoidable. It will be worse the more you fight it."

"Until I can't remember why I'm fighting." Jack has to find him. "You know what this reminds me of? Those old attempts to reprogram an Omnic. I remember cleaning up after those, because we always had to _destroy them_ -" But even his anger is wearing out. He's exhausted. He's trying his damnedest not to show it, but he can see her eyes skimming the readouts on a panel.

"I had to do something bigger," she says. "I'm not a soldier. Talon has resources, but it has more threats. It won't survive unless it can fight. It doesn't have a spearhead, someone who can order and teach our forces. I can't be that person." She reaches out to him. "But you can." Her fingertips rest in the space between his collarbones. "You will." Her eyes narrow, and her voice changes. "Don't."

He has just enough time to realize that her order stopped him from spitting in her face. Then she flips a switch on the panel. She turns away, glowing wings swinging up, as white light slams through his skull.

**

A whisper of air on his skin. Bare feet, padding on the floor. He closes his eyes and tries not to think of how long it's been. There's no way to tell, especially since they've committed to fucking around with his sleep schedule. He looks up. Jesse's grace has gotten more obvious. There's a glide to how he's walking that wasn't there before, and his balance has gone from a brawler's to... fuck, Gabriel doesn't know, a tightrope walker or some shit.

"You look like shit," Jesse observes.

"You look ridiculous." Shiny, skintight, metallic blue. "I've seen flies that color, dead in windows." Jesse comes up like always, into Gabriel's space, reaching up to his face. Gabriel wonders if that's the programming. 

"Let's do somethin' different," Jesse says. His accent's flattened out, but nothing, Gabriel feels a tiny glow as he notes, consistently hangs the _g_ s back on his words.

"We going for a walk?"

"Just pretendin'." Jesse leans in close. He smells different. Some kind of cologne? Are they really fucking with him that far? Is he their doll? Outrage stirs and flickers out. "Can we pretend it's over?"

"We're out?"

"You're in."

"Jesse-"

Jesse's fingers settle on the back of his neck, kneading. "Just play along with me. I think about it all the time, what it'd be like, not bein' alone anymore. Knowin' you're not stuck in here."

"You could have gotten Jack," he whispers.

"I can't." Jesse's fingers are strong. Muscles that have been still and cold for too long are comforted under his touch. Gabriel feels a little more human. "I can't go against Talon. If I think about it..." he trails off. "When I come in here, you send me out again. Stop sendin' me away. Just pretend you come out with me. See the sunlight. Go to the range. Help talk 'em into a plan for me that's more my style."

 "What are they making you do?"

"They want someone who gathers intelligence and does recon. They're teachin' me to do flips and swing around on lines."

"Are you serious."

"Yeah. Hit a ceiling the other day. Just lifted myself right into it."

"Jesus Christ. Do you still have the fucking helmet?"

"Not since yesterday."

"You're a gunslinger. You always will be. You've got that bizarre, bastard skill that lets you fuck around pretending you're a sniper, but you think in terms of close-range work. That won't ever change." He rests his head on McCree's shoulder. He's so warm, the thin material does nothing to hold his body heat. "Whatever I do, you go with me."

"Yeah? What do you do?"

 "I don't know."

"Yeah, you do. Even in a game of pretend, you've got a plan."

"I get us in. You get what we need. I get us out." He shrugs. "We take along a hacker. Or we target computers, things we can already have the resources to dump into a card and carry it with us. There's not much that can stop us, working together. You know that."

"Sounds like fun. You still using shotguns?"

 "When do I not? What are they making you carry around, a bow and arrow?"

"They're tryin' to make me switch to sniper, full-time."

"They're making you swing on lines with tights glued over your ass. It's pretty clear they don't know what they're doing with you."

"You goin' to tell them better?"

"Damn straight-" horror crawls down his spine as he realizes he's already framing it in part of his head. "That easy," he breathes. He pulls his head back, pressing it against sensors and cold metal. "No. McCree - I'm not playing anymore."  

McCree nods. Reaches up to cup Gabriel's face in his fingers, leans in like he's going to kiss him. Gabriel shuts his eyes and turns his face away, against one broad hand. After a moment, McCree backs off. This time, he doesn't wait to be sent away.

Gabriel watches him go. He doesn't cry. He feels too burned away.  


	4. Mirage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the shadows.

Jack's first raid is a success, by all measures but his.

"I was sure of it," he says, leaning his head on the glass window looking into the infirmary's secure room. Angela looks up from the sensor readouts of her new patient. She was working outside Overwatch during the whole planning phase. Jack hadn't wanted to disturb her, so he left on the raid before she was back. She had been hopeful enough to fly out and join them for the mop-up. 

"I know," she says. "It all looked promising for a place to keep a prisoner like him." 

"All that crazy experimental bullshit. The restraints, strong enough to keep me or Reinhardt in there. The doctor that bit down on her suicide pill the moment she saw the blockade ahead. All that - you're sure? You're sure his DNA was nowhere in that whole fucking building?" 

"I scanned all the vials they kept," she says. "I even ran a quick search over the air filters for uncleaned hair or skin. The only possible matches were fragments. They could have come from anyone." 

Jack nods, staring through the glass. "Is she going to make it?" There is a blue-skinned woman lying in a bed, struggling to breathe. She is sedated, and there is an oxygen mask on her face. Jack has been told that her unusually low body temperature makes her vulnerable to infections that most people cannot get. So she is in the infirmary's sealed chamber where Angela usually helps Genji change fluids. Angela murmurs something sad at her discomfort, steps inside, makes some adjustments, and returns. The patient is breathing more easily. 

"Probably not," Angela says when the door is sealed, and there is no chance a patient in twilight sleep can hear her. "I don't know why you'd want to drop someone's heart rate that slowly, but it's clearly not helping her to function. I am looking into how to reverse it, but I do not think I have time." 

The patient doesn't survive the night. Jack is not surprised.  

**

Months later, Overwatch is still bleeding. Jack grits his teeth. To close the wound, he folds Blackwatch.

He does it as gently as he can. Some of it cannot be spared. When he can't trust the agents or leaders, he gives out honorable discharges, or he asks for retirements. The rest are shepherded into Overwatch, into carefully drawn lines and rigid rules.  The more he does, the more he finds; Blackwatch was a PR disaster waiting to spill.

Some of it does spill, disgruntled punks hoping to leave a black eye on the way out. But more of it is contained. Shame, dishonor, disgrace; the wound is gangrenous and Jack struggles to forgive Gabriel. But he needs him _there_ to yell at. To hear from. Talon is somehow unified, despite all the little cells it's lost, as if it's just been resting in Overwatch's shadow. 

Before the year is out, Talon moves as if nothing had happened. Jack's friends gather in his office as soon as he spreads the news. It's a council of war. Ana and Mercy sit side by side. Winston is at the end of the couch, Tracer perched on the back. Reinhardt takes up Jack's favorite armchair. Jack has his desk chair. Genji, who came back from Shambali guidance for this crisis, is leaning against the wall. Zenyatta hovers by him. Torbjorn sits on a turret he was building while talking to Jack. The turret is not armed.  

"Why now?" asks Tracer.

"They went underground waiting for something to happen," Jack agrees. "For a plan to move forward. Now they're ready to act. Which means they think they're ready for us." There is a little silence in the room. It's clear that Overwatch has suffered more than Talon in the first trade of blows. Jack quietly doubts himself. He didn't really draw blood. Neither did Gabriel. Why not? Even if he's more suited to crushing metal armies than outthinking human opponents, Gabriel sure as hell was - isn't. It's like something had crippled them, the whole time. He and Gabriel would have figured it out by now, he's sure.

"So what are they acting?" Tracer asks.

"They have an agent in play. He and an unidentified attacker made a raid on a facility researching EMP bombs that don't cause massive, normal explosions too." Jack hits the slides. "From carelessly secured comms, we've caught their agent's codename: Faithbreaker. This is the clearest view we've got from security cameras." The roof is empty, even in the camera's night vision, until suddenly a person in a lab coat bursts from a door and starts running across the roof. A figure explodes out of the shadows. The two fall together. The running figure has a broken neck before they hit the ground. The assassin takes something from the pocket of the lab coat. He gets up like nothing happened. He strolls towards the open door. There's movement in the blackness past the frame. The assassin steps in. The door closes behind him.

"What's that on his head?" asks Ana.

"Some kind of multipurpose helmet." Jack shrugs and rewinds. They can all see the figure has only two weapons: a sniper rifle on his back, a pistol strapped to one thigh. There is nowhere on his costume for a knife to go. Or anything else, really.  

"What in hell is he wearing?" Torbjorn's disbelief is not long contained.

"The shininess is to help scatter long-distance scanners," says Ana, "to slow any snipers trying to set up a shot." She shrugs. "That works as well as you would think in normal scopes. I've never trusted it."

"But," Torbjorn says, with an engineer's eye to functionality, "why-"

Ana raises her hands. "I don't have a reason why he would want it skintight." They all look at Tracer.

"Loose fabric makes snapping noises whenever I accelerate," Tracer says, "and sometimes the air tears it. Maybe his is like that for infiltration? It would be easy to get any costume on over it." She studies the tape. "Literally. Anything."  

"I've put out a couple of calls to former Blackwatch agents, asking for ears to go to the ground," Ana says. "A lot of them are not responding at all. I think we should look into that."

"Faithbreaker," says Winston. "Is that a reference to a religious order?" They all look at Zenyatta.

"Specifically, none that I am familiar with."

"I'll have it thrown back at our analysts," Jack says.

Tracer is playing the tape forward. "Is that someone in there?"

"If it is, it's more Talon," says Ana. "It does make sense that someone was chasing them into the ambush."

"I think I see a glint like light reflecting," Tracer says, frowning. "Metal edges." They all look at Zenyatta again, just a reflex when they are picturing an Omnic. Zenyatta does not seem to react.

"You've been quiet, Angela," Jack says.

"I'm thinking," she says. "What did he take?"

Jack clears his throat. "We think it's the security pass. It could also have been the blueprints. The facility provided us with access to their external feeds, but nothing of what happened inside."

"They're up to something illegal," Ana finishes.

"Probably. We've got agents holding it secure right now while our legal teams request a little more... cooperation."

"Talon is moving with a plan," Ana says. "I would like to take a proactive approach."

"I think we should take any opportunity we see," Angela says.

"Well," Winston says, "since you mention it, I went ahead and had Athena analyze as much shipping data as I could find, looking for supplies that matched what that facility was stockpiling." He nods as Angela's eyes widen. "There's another one like it in Canada-"

"I'll go." Tracer hops up.

"I'll go with you."

 **

Genji sits quietly while Jack and Winston throw together a plan of action. He is glad that nobody has mentioned his silence. They all take it for granted that he is still distracted, still driven by the ill-fitting feeling that drove him away in the first place. But it is more complicated than that. It is Zenyatta, here, an emblem of the peace he has found. It is the fact that Mercy has not looked at him.

He wanted to introduce them. Mercy brought him back from the dead, Mercy gave him back autonomy, freedom of movement. All the choices that seem empty now that his brother has lost their home, but still _his_ choices, every one. Mercy cried, once, because she could not give him better. She wished him happiness.  

Zenyatta helped him to replace his violence with peace. He is still not at ease with himself, but he feels... he feels like he has seen a glimpse of the Iris. Like he is a part of a beautiful day again, instead of a sliver of a man trapped within another person's art.

So he was looking forward to introducing them, to bridging the maker of his body with the repairer of his psyche. And instead, there's... disconnection. Coldness.

He doesn't understand it. He doesn't have the luxury to think about it; Talon is a menace they have yet to put in check.

"Doctor," he says softly, while Tracer is pitching in with an opinion on the forming plan, "would you look over the attachments in my back? Zenyatta is reluctant to touch my work."

"He should be," she says. He can hear the faintest edge. She heaves a breath out. "Of course. If we do it now, perhaps you can go with Tracer and Winston."

He shakes his head. He wants time to think, he wants time to talk. "They work well together. I do not think they need me on a scouting mission."  

"I-" she seems very reluctant for a moment, but she smiles. "It can wait." She doesn't seem pleased to find him waiting with Zenyatta when the meeting is over, but she goes to speak with Jack with a smile on her face.

Genji and Zenyatta are waiting when she reaches her infirmary. She stops when she sees them. "Genji," she says, "would you mind giving me a few minutes? I-"

"Medic!" A soldier is dragging another one in.

"Quit fussing," the other one is scolding. "It's just a sprain."

Angela takes a deep breath. Genji glances at Zenyatta. He jerks his head, motioning for them to get out of the way. They sit on chairs at the wall while Angela works. She seems to be getting annoyed, although she smiles and changes her tone when Genji asks if everything is all right. Genji can't understand what the problem is. This is a completely typical infirmary experience.

He doesn't like it.

**

The sniper rifle is in its case, along with all the complicated technology they brought. Reaper knows which ones are bugged. He knows they are not being heard; not over the sides of the cases, the distance, the soft tapping of the rain on the leaves. Otherwise, he would have hit Faithbreaker the moment he started the syllable. It is dangerous. "Ariel," Faithbreaker says. Reaper glances at the side of his jaw, the perfect line of his collar against the side of his neck, the straight line of his hair drawn towards his ponytail. _Faithbreaker_ is in his mind at once, the only name he ever has for that face. "Ariel. Ariel. Ariel. Ariel. Ariel."

A month ago, a mechanic looked towards the shadows where they were, and called, "Abe?" Reaper broke his neck. Then he paused in the mission and stood over him, frowning, tasting the sound in his mouth, until Faithbreaker clapped him on the shoulder and nudged him away.

They are both attuned to the significance of sounds. Reaper knows the words to bring Faithbreaker back into compliance if there is any... fraying. He is not sure if Faithbreaker knows his or not. He thinks not. Their handlers seem to think there is a vast gulf between them. He stops at this realization, every time, although he can see the lines of thoughts beyond it.

"Ariel. Ariel. Ariel." Reaper is listening, locking the syllables away. Faithbreaker's right. This is a piece. "Ariel... I don't think it's me." Faithbreaker settles down to disappointment. "I'm nowhere."  

"I see you," Reaper says. The lines of Faithbreaker's face shift, and he adjust the way he's sitting so that it's less collapse and more comfort. Reaper realizes he has missed a step in their usual routine. He scoots over, without comment, letting his coat drag over the stone. When he is still again, Faithbreaker moves onto it and settles against him. Reaper turns his hand so that the spikes on the back of his palm can't accidentally scrape him.  

"Do you think I was a priest?" Faithbreaker asks. Reaper cannot help the laughter. Faithbreaker scowls. "The name came from somewhere."

"You were a priest, if I was a farmer," Reaper says. "Symbolism."

"Like the devil horns," Faithbreaker says.

Reaper nods. He knows what Faithbreaker's talking about; when they remember pain easing, they remember the horns between them and the light. Reaper reaches up, rubbing the back of Faithbreaker's neck until his head falls forward and he lets out a long breath.

They don't discuss things like _what's this mission_ because that would be, in some way, questioning Talon's plans, attempting to prioritize them. The mission is theirs, and they will complete it. But everything they won't say on the base, in the transports, in Talon's hearing, is fair game.

An interruption turns their heads. The light on the side of the visor, resting in the rain, just blinked. They have a transmission. It's time to go. They look over the hillside, over the valley, to the lights of the facility. Faithbreaker slides the visor over his head and seals it. Only his lips and chin show. Something about that jutting chin makes Reaper think that his hair should be blond. Pushing that thought gives him no further connections, as though he walked into a spiderweb and the ends broke away.

There is no more time for his own concerns. They know their mission. Reaper leads the way, shotguns on his back. He stops dead, lifting a hand. Faithbreaker steps up behind him. Reaper ducks down and crawls towards the rocks at the foot of the slope. Faithbreaker is his shadow, as always.

Blue light, erratically moving in the valley below, like a firefly.

There are complications.

Faithbreaker is already passing him the scope feed and swinging the rifle off his back.


	5. Funhouse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brush of fates.

_How do I know how to fight a giant monkey?_

It's the only question in his mind for a moment as he watches the display screen linked to the scope. Faithbreaker is tracking the monkey's head. His finger is resting in the trigger guard, not yet touching the trigger. It's wearing glasses. It's undoubtedly from the Moon. Somehow, Reaper has a plan for fighting giant monkeys from the Moon. He does not remember his handlers instructing him to come up with this. (A lot of things have just come to him. Breaking down the shotguns to clean before it occurred to him to do it. The right way to assemble the gear they gave him, until the unfamiliar armor. How Faithbreaker wants it when he's held against the wall. _Why_ he has prior knowledge, from the haze before he was lifted off the table? Skirted. But he adds this new fact to the list.)

Faithbreaker's scope lingers.  He waits for a few turns of the beast's head, enough to make out its glasses. Then he starts sweeping for the blue flash. It's a star on the chest of a woman. Faithbreaker zooms in on it. She is gone, too suddenly. He makes a soft sound and zooms out, looking for her again. She is nowhere to be seen.

Unknowns. The mission is very clear, and they are in the way. He looks from Faithbreaker's weapons to his own. Sufficient. He abandons the feed, rolling the screen back in its case and putting it away; it is a good way to share thoughts without words, but a spotter's work is not seeing exactly what the sniper does. It is seeing more. He checks through binoculars instead. The woman is gone. The monkey is still going towards their mission.

However she is moving, she is less predictable (sort of) than the monkey, which cannot warp around a battlefield. She is going to be harder to hit. For that, she is priority. He taps Faithbreaker on the shoulder and designates his current target as secondary with a few hand gestures.

They start moving. They're near the base when they hear engines. Faithbreaker is gone immediately, firing a line into the treetops and lifting himself up. "The security forces are leaving," he says in disbelief. "Those two are staying."

Reaper says nothing. There is no need. They know the mission; only the interference has changed.

**

Lena isn't sure why the hairs on the back of her neck are standing up. It's not just that it's so dark, and so clean and white. She's got a creepy feeling. She does her best to keep her mind on work.

Since the EMP technology here isn't supposed to harm people and building structure, the windowless building is inside a shielding dome. She can still picture it, a huge, white egg. The research center is shaped like an oval, this one lain on its side. Long walkways connect workstations at both ends. There are three layers to the building. The lowest floor is painted concrete, with giant trapdoors lifted by pulleys and counterweights. Those conceal the protected chambers in which the research computers, and research, is stored.

Because the building is under a dome, there is no natural light. Since they are in an experimental facility studying EMP technology, there are emergency candles and tiny boxes of matches along the walls of every floor. She can look up and track floor edges and barred white railings all the way up to the vault overhead. The only thing dampening the noise is the sound-eating covers on the floors. Just about every sudden sound still echoes.

The doors are all heavy, double-bolted with several keys each. There is no hacking into this building. That would just allow an easy way in when an EMP misfire shut everything down.

Winston moves to cover the guard station. Tracer starts patrolling. Since she's not in any hurry, she just goes around the stairs and floors at typical walking pace, looking up and down the white-lit stretches of floor, or across the way.

She's on the second floor when the lights cut out.

Tracer automatically brings her hands up to cover her chronal accelerator, crouching low to hide the glow behind her knees, and looks around. One hand fishes an inert pulse bomb by her belt and hooks it into the side of the accelerator, where it can start charging. Her eyes, adjusting to the loss of white light, are casting around for any light in the darkness. One level up, near the railing, she sees six points of glowing red-

Tracer launches herself to the side, blipping forward. The first shot hurts her ears, echoing off hard metal and bare concrete. Rifle. _Shit._ She returns fire, trying to throw off the figure's accuracy. She hears the second bullet zip by her head. The range favors the sniper, not her.  

Winston kicks the lights back on just before she runs into the shotgun.

Tracer squeaks, throwing herself sideways. She lands hard on the floor and skids towards the railing, blinking away just as the shotgun booms. She looks back to see flying concrete. She knows she is likely dead, caught in the open, with two different calibers aimed at her. Blinking away from the figure will just leave her in the open for them both to shoot.

She subtracts in the only way she can. She blinks towards the man in black, putting herself against the far wall. His armored body looms between herself and the sniper. She shoots the hell out of his side, as many shots as she can squeeze off. Although no armor can protect him from a sideful of bullet impact, he turns to face her, raising one gauntlet to spare his ribs. The shotgun swings around. Tracer concentrates on the accelerator and recalls. Part of her brain is always on where she was a few seconds ago. She has her bearings immediately. She takes off, starting to run from both of them.

She's expecting to hear gunshots. Instead, loud cracking and metal screeching reach her. She spares a glance across the way. Oh. Winston didn't bother with the stairs. He just jumped up, leaping from floor to floor on the outside, and smashed the hell out of the surface under the sniper's feet. The sniper has fallen on his ass. The light gleams off his catsuit like it's a second skin, slick and dark. It runs into the unforgiving, metal black of the helmet clamped on his head. The effect is monstrous, like a thing crouched on his head, puppeting his body.

The shotgun booms. Her heart leaps. She wonders if she is dead.

She sees fur puff on Winston's back and hear his cry of pain. It wasn't aimed at her. Tracer whirls, firing both pistols in  a stream of rage. The shotguns are turned her way immediately, and she is forced to blink to the side. Stinging burns her, hot air and explosive blast, a near miss.

The sniper shoots a wire across the empty space between the floors. He leaps away from the angry gorilla, body a tight, black line. He cuts a graceful curve through the air. The third floor railing screeches, long and angry. It starts to peel down from the walkway. She hopes he breaks his neck. She has no time to watch. She's still dealing with the shotguns.

Two shotguns. Inhuman toughness. That creepy feeling seizes her. She blinks away twice. The figure strides after her. It is slower but feels inevitable, watching fixedly.

"...Commander?" she asks. The mask tips, although the footfalls continue at the same pace. She counts the seconds. Three... two...

She recalls. He fired standing here; the taste of smoke and burnt chemicals fills her nose and mouth. She doesn't shoot him in the back, because that would tip him off. She takes two steps to the railing and swings herself over. She can see him start to turn, but she's already dropping down. Winston will need help with that rifle.

The rifle cracks as she thinks that, and there's a roar of pain.

"Winston!" she screams. The sniper has his foot on the railing, angling his gun down towards the floor. Tracer launches herself forward with two blinks and fires. She's too far away for a good shot, but two bullets hit the man's arm, two hit the rifle as he lifts it to cover his head. He drops the ruined rifle, pistol raised as he turns to face her. She already knows her back is not covered. The armored man has likely followed her down by now. She blinks back to the third floor.

She hopes they'll hit each other in the crossfire. She hears no shots. The armored man is nowhere in sight. That means he is now below her, on the same floor as the sniper. Tracer estimates their position and runs. A pulse bomb is charged. She drops it over the edge to go off in the air below her level. It doesn't matter if it actually hits anyone. She just wants them to get down.

As soon as it goes off, she swings over the railing. She drops down one level. They are tangled together against the wall, in black and drips of red. She catches the railing just enough to break her fall. She drops again. (A shotgun blast blows the railing away above her head.) Her feet hit the concrete floor. She runs to Winston. "Winston! Are you-" he's bleeding. There is blood running over the floor. "Oh, no! Come on!"

She hears the smack of feet hitting the floor. She looks up. The sniper is leaning on the railing above her, wounded. He is using the strap of his rifle to stop the bleeding, clutching one end in his hand, the other in his teeth. The figure raises his shotgun and fires once into the floor at his side. Tracer watches the concrete crack. A crater appears. She has no idea why he did that. She sees the sniper take something from his holster. It's too small to be a pistol.

Then the dark shape folds his shotguns over his chest and charges.

Winston lifts a hand, trying to pull him behind her, to shield her with his body. Whatever his friend is doing is suddenly less important. Tracer blips away from him, shooting center mass, trying to slow that relentless run. It's like trying to stop a truck with a water cannon. She can see his gauntlets scar and ding. She lifts her pistols towards his mask. He brings his shotguns up to cover his face, and does not slow.

He will be in range for those shotguns to devastate Winston's bulk. She runs to the side, angling towards the figure to give him a more tempting target, trying to drag his aim away from the huddled gorilla. Both shotguns swing up. "Lena!" Winston roars.

Lena blinks.

She realizes her error the moment she lands in the crater. Something bursts underfoot, and she chokes as purplish gas fills the air. Wheezing, she drops low, dragging herself to one side.

Winston roars with pure rage.

**

Fucking _finally._ Faithbreaker breathes a sigh of relief. The duo is tenacious and difficult to fight. He draws his pistol. The gorilla is getting up, its eyes filled with rage, its hair on end, ignoring its reddened wounds. A voice crackles in his ear. He lifts the gun anyway, putting it in line with the back of the woman's head. Then the words click, and he stills. Meaningless words that he forgets as soon as he hears, but that still command him:  

_Cease fire. Abort. Withdraw._

It's a Talon order. His pistol swings down. Below him, Reaper is getting hurled by an angry gorilla, thrown through the air and smashed into a railing a floor up. Even with _cease fire_ just in his ears, that's not something he can tolerate. He grabs his rifle, snapping the straps back on. His arm with the line has a bullet in it, so he can't use it to get down there. He swings off the railing and drops down. The gorilla whirls, intent on protecting its friend, and charges him. He throws his remaining packets of gas in the beast's face.

He's pretty sure all he did was blind it and piss it off harder, but that's okay, he can work with _blind_. Reaper got the order, same as he did, and is getting up, shotguns returning to his back. They run, Faithbreaker graceless with pain and injury.  

"Wait!" He turns his head. The woman in orange is staring after them, still choking, but just one packet of gas is nonlethal. "Wait!" She's springing to her feet. Faithbreaker staggers. The gorilla, rage cooled by confusion, splutters for air. Faithbreaker's pain is weakening him, slowing him.   

Reaper grabs Faithbreaker around the waist and drags him into the night.

**

Overwatch is in the air and on the way. Talon can't retrieve them as planned. They are given orders of where to go, how to get there. Faithbreaker releases the tourniquet around his arm, packing the wounds with gauze instead.

They do not speak until they hit the saferoom. Turning it on  risk a spike of energy, will _definitely_ power any equipment that reports on what the inhabitants are doing. Reaper unpacks emergency lights and sets them out. The room is bare and dusty. The toilet and shower grating in one corner have no privacy. Faithbreaker sweeps it with an unimpressed look.

Reaper carefully packs their masks away in the soundproof case, stashing it in the cache under the floor. His coat, smelling of familiar smoke, goes on the floor in the corner. He pulls his armor off. Blooms of bruises swim into sight on his dusky skin. He ignores them, checking himself over brusquely for any bullet holes. Then he drops onto his coat, lifts his chin, and jerks his head. Faithbreaker settles into his lap. Reaper strips away the catsuit with efficient sweeps of his hands.

"Hold still." Reaper does not speak on missions unless the situation is critical. Even afterwards, he is terse. Faithbreaker sits quietly. Reaper cracks open the first aid kit.

He finds one bullet hole has an entry and exit wound. One lodged in the thickness of the soldier's arm. "I think it broke the bone. It'll have to come out."

Faithbreaker nods, folding the rifle strap over and biting down on it. Reaper works quickly, his strength letting him wrench the bullet free and flip it over the floor before Faithbreaker has finished his scream. He flicks the biotic emitter on and places it on the coat beside him. A long, slow exhale of relief comes through Reaper's lips. Faithbreaker mops tears off his face. Reaper drags insistently at his hip and good arm, getting him to lie down on the other side of the emitter so their bodies can soak up its energy equally.  

"Internal injury?" Faithbreaker wonders.

"Grabbed by ankles and thrown into a railing by an angry gorilla. Possible."

 "Overwatch."

"Gorilla and teleporting woman. Interesting."

They lie in quiet.

"Thought that would be easier," Faithbreaker says.

Reaper's voice is very low. Very soft. "She asked if I was a commander."

Faithbreaker opens his eyes, studying the face opposite his. It's... it's always going to be familiar, even if _Reaper_ is what he thinks. He flexes his fingers, rolls his hand, and dares to move his forearm, but hot pain lances down his arm. Reaper rolls his eyes and catches his wrist, holding it still against his hip.

"Commander Real?" Faithbreaker questions in a murmur. "Commander Abe?" There is a long moment, while he sees Reaper struggle with the sounds. Then the man gives a tiny shake of his head, and drops in exhaustion.

"We shouldn't," he concedes. Faithbreaker pushes his lips tight, wanting to protest, but perhaps this is how he earned his name. Perhaps Talon has given him another chance, despite some earlier treachery. He doesn't want to let Reaper down. If Reaper wants it to rest, it rests.

They lie quietly. Faithbreaker dozes. When he wakes up, Reaper is pulling the gauze away to check his arm. The place where he removed the bullet will scar, but it will not be severe. Reaper flicks the emitter off and puts it away while Faithbreaker packs the soiled gauze. They will take it with them. Reaper goes for his mask and checks in. He keeps the transmission brief.

"Wait the day," he reports, as he places it back. "Then we move out."

"The day," Faithbreaker repeats. A tiny grin tugs at Reaper's lips, but he says nothing while he packs the mask, seals the box, tucks it away under the floors as if putting away a tiny, sleeping monster. He picks up a couple of lights as he comes back. They will need to save some for the hours ahead.

Faithbreaker waits quietly until Reaper comes over, settling down beside him. He lifts his face automatically. Reaper's smile is sudden, tiny, but real. They smell of blood and gunsmoke, cooled sweat, musk. They are unlikely to have a chance for a real shower; the saferoom has a grille to let water run out, and some bottled water. But they have time.

Reaper's hair is tight-curled and short. He regrets that he can't tangle his fingers in it. Reaper grabs his hair tie, flicks it across the floor, tousles his hair around his face with a short gesture that's almost aggressive. Touching him feels new and confusing with the lights on. He can't stop smiling. This is what Reaper's body looks like. This is the contrast of their skins. This is what their hands look like, together. Faithbreaker kisses him. Reaper seals their lips, sucks Faithbreaker's tongue into his mouth, assuring him that he will not speak any words that Talon has given. Faithbreaker relaxes, glorying in the feeling of warm skin over firm muscle up and down his body.

He hungered for this while -  while what? He can remember some cold, unpleasant alone, and he skims his mind away from the thoughts and focuses on what he has.

Eventually they will keep themselves ready for Talon's work. They will spar, they will wrestle, they will push each other to be their best; but for now, their mission has been taken away and Talon has not yet taken them in. This little slice of time is theirs.

Reaper's hands are gentle, but inevitable, as if he will never let go. Faithbreaker tries to keep his hands that strong. That assured. He wraps his knee around Reaper's in blatant invitation. Reaper chuckles into his mouth and rolls them over.


	6. Mirror

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things do not go as planned.

"Angela?" Genji asks. The light slides across the floor of the infirmary. Mercy stands out thin and white, like the flat of a blade, against the ink of the window. She jolts up, turning around, sliding something under her charts.

"Yes, Genji?"

"Sorry. I... you seemed worried about something." 

She gets up, heaving out a long breath. "Don't worry about me. I've got a lot to think about, always." She still looks worried, but her brow has smoothed.

"There's a lot left to do," he says. "Even with Blackwatch reformed."

She shrugs. "We must continue to shine a light in dark places."

"You think it was that bad?" She shakes her head, and smiles wanly, declining to speak ill of Gabriel, he decides. He settles down in the window beside her. From here, he can see all the base. It's peaceful. "I was wondering if you'd care to come meditate with us tomorrow. It can be very helpful to the concentration."

She shakes her head. "I'll manage, Genji. I have a lot left to do."

Their datapads go off at the same time. They both leap to their feet. Mercy whips hers off her belt. "Jack," she says. "Go. I have to lock up."

He glances back at the door. She's still at the window, brushing her pile of charts into order, hands slow.

Genji goes. But the feeling of worry in the back of his mind is crawling as if it has small, spidery legs.

**

Jack is on the landing platform when they land, and Tracer is in his face in the next second. "Jack!" Mercy is headed by, assessing Winston, who is sitting on the plane floor with his hand on a bandage. Blood cakes the fur on his back. "Jack! I think that was Gabriel!" Mercy keeps going in fast steps.

"Lena." Tracer has both hands on Jack's shoulders. Jack lays his hands over hers, just holding her there while he looks her in the eye. "I heard you. I hear you. We'll talk about it. Let me help Winston first." She nods. Winston is conscious and able to move, and Mercy is applying as much painkiller as she is sure will help. Their zoologist is in the hospital with a complication, but gunshot wounds are something that can be generalized to gorillas. Reinhardt runs up as Jack gets a cargo platform. Between Winston's good arm and legs, Reinhardt's massive shoulders, and Jack's enhanced muscles, they quickly get him on a cargo platform. Genji helps Tracer steady herself. Then Tracer blinks ahead to open the infirmary doors. They're wide-set, and the cargo lifter rumbles in without any problems. Jack glances along the way they've come. The dirty lifter leaves wide, black tracks on the polished floor. Mercy, an angel in Elysium in the gleaming white of the room, is too intent on her patient to notice. Jack jerks his chin to the chairs at the back of the infirmary as Ana comes in.

"Anything I can do to help?" Ana asks.

"Just sit tight!" Mercy shears away the fur on Winston's shoulder, frowns at the damage from a shotgun, tightens down a salve-soaked bandage, and leaves the less serious wound while she attends to the rifle shot.

"He-" Lena blinks as he brushes stuck-together hair away from her face. There's smoke and grime over part of her orange jumpsuit. Shotguns, like the kind Gabriel used, sprayed a lot of fire.

"Could Faithbreaker be Jesse?" Jack asks. Tracer goes still. Reinhardt folds his arms. Ana is still watching Mercy work. "If that's Gabriel in a mask?"

"I know," she says, "but..." She pauses. "Jesse's like me," she says proudly. "I'd know him through full-body armor." Her grin finally wavers onto her face. "I'd need more than a box on his head before I missed a fellow firecracker."

"There are getting to be very many people in the infirmary," Mercy says politely, her gloves bloodied to the elbow as she works, as Zenyatta hovers in the door. "I must concentrate on our friend. Please allow us this meeting." Winston grunts in pain. Mercy quickly grabs the anaesthetic tubes and gives him another shot. Zenyatta fades back into the hallway. Genji draws breath, but glances between Tracer and Winston and goes silent.

Jack is reflecting carefully on Tracer's words. When he heard Tracer freaking out over the radio, saying she'd fought Gabriel, Jack believed her. He threw the footage of Faithbreaker at his analysts again immediately, demanding a comparison with McCree. The proportions are right. The height is right. The chin is right. And he and Gabriel were both taken at the same time by Talon.  But Jack just nods. He asked for her impression, and he got it. "Can you go over it again, Tracer? Step by step."

"You got it," she says. She clears her throat and starts recounting. She keeps her voice calm and even, trying not to stress Winston. He throws in the occasional interjection, but for the most part, he is busy trying to hold as still as possible so Mercy can work. "When I recalled," she says, "and I ran into poison gas, I was completely sure. It was him."

Jack thinks he sees the connection. He tests it anyway. "He's never used poison gas."

"He saw me blink back to where I started twice," she says. "He knows my abilities. So he figured out where I'd be when I did it. He signalled his ally to put a gas... thing there. And then he drove me right to it. Think about the timing that would take, and the confidence to be sure he could stay behind me if I just started trying to blink around him." She shrugs. "That's not just anyone." She slaps the wall with a palm. "We know who that is."

"But he didn't respond to you. And he tried to shoot you."

Her body language collapses into stillness. "He didn't even slow down. I think he looked at me differently. I think he moved his head. But it didn't stop him." She heaves a huge sigh.

"We caught a transmission from an unidentified source," Jack says. He pulls out his datapad and plays the recording. A woman's voice, flattened and electronic, says: "Anteater. Pluto." Jack shrugs. "That's all we've got."

"Anteater pluto." Lena taps her fingers on the side of her chair.

"EMP research sites are placed as far from communications as they can go. We had detection all over the airwaves. An encrypted message would have been detectable as a signal, even if we couldn't crack it. So we got code, 'anteater pluto,' in the open."

Lena does her best to sound like the woman. "Anteater. Pluto. Anteater. Pluto. Anteater. Pluto." She shrugs at them. "What? It's better than nothing if Gabriel Reyes catches me flat-footed while he's... what did they do to him?"

"Gabriel asked about human experimentation," Jack reminds them. "He didn't say what he suspected."

With a grunt of effort, Mercy injects Winston with a syringe of biotics as wide as her forearm. "Chemical treatments, most likely," she says. "To induce hallucinations, perhaps, or just extreme suggestibility. It's possible the transmission wasn't to _them_ at all, but to an injection unit in their clothing."

"I don't know," Lena says, when they all look at her. "I don't think they acted drugged in any way. But I don't know. I was too gassed to observe them when they broke off."

Ana is the one to speak. "What happens if someone who is chemically controlled is captured? Would it wear off?"

Mercy looks up from her second assessment of the shotgun injury. "Perhaps use something with a very long half-life? Or equip their armor with something that can kill them if removed the wrong way? Or use something that will kill them with withdrawal? I don't know. This isn't something I've had to put a lot of thought into before."

"Gabriel's been out of sight for a long time, if they had some other form of mind control," Reinhardt says. "Lena. Are you going to be all right?"  

Lena nods. "Wait," she says. "One more thing. Gabriel... if that's really him? He was helping the other soldier." Jack glances to Ana. They share a suspicion: _Jesse_. "If it's Gabriel, some part of him is still in there, the part that looks out for the people trying to help him. I think it got turned around. But it's in there."

"True," Mercy says, smiling. She cleans blood from Winston's fur with a cloth. "All right - just stay calm and rest. I can't put you under, it's too dangerous, but I am willing to try a bit more anaesthetic if you can't relax." She strips off her gloves. "It's so good to see you back safe. We were worried sick, Winston. You and Lena have no idea."

"Thank you, Dr. Ziegler."

"You think we can capture and rehabilitate him?" Ana asks cautiously.

"I would like to take plenty of precautions," she answers. "I do not think we are ready to contain him. And I need to look into the latest research for chemicals that might have been used."

"You think there was no chance that it could have been a different form of brainwashing?" Genji asks. "I remember you were talking about a report about regenerating brain damage caused by interference. It was years ago, now. When you were working on the neural hookups for my prosthetics."

"Research has been moving away from that," she says brusquely. Genji's head rocks back, but he says nothing further. "I need to confer with a toxicologist." She puts a hand on an unbruised part of Winston's arm, smiling at him. "But I would definitely say there is hope."

 **

"A message from Torchbearer," says a voice behind Reaper. Reaper does not turn, does not look, although he is listening intently. He has told them what he has observed. He hopes they will listen, although it is faint, and easily ignored.

A man walks by, armored, carrying  a weapon. He glances twice at the shotgun that Reaper is placing in its case. Reaper looks up, curious, but the man averts his gaze and goes on.

"News?" asks the scientist.

"Orders. We're to keep the assets off the field unless she's approved the mission."

"Too bad. That new neuroscientist could have benefited from a first meeting with Faithbreaker." A woman's hand claps Reaper's shoulder. He was expecting it, this woman touches them carelessly, and does not move. "Or this one. Are the mercenaries out?"

"Yes."  

She flicks his mask off, using the side to push his face up. "Take Faithbreaker to the armory. Discuss your ideas there. We'll review it when you have your request ready. You're right about one thing. The two of you should not have had that kind of difficulty with a gorilla."

"I still think 'Seditionist' was a better name," he hears behind him as he moves. "Sometimes that sounds like 'Facebreaker.'"

"And you think that's a problem? That's why we outvoted your codename. 'Hellbait' my ass. Sounds like 'jailbait.'"

"'Kingsnare' kicked ass, too."

"And what did we all say? We all said it sounded like a garage band. Did you already have a shirt printed up?"

The door closes behind him. He takes a deep breath of the cold air. Torchbearer is smarter than both of them, and he is grateful for that. He puts all shades of criticism from his mind, and walks to find Faithbreaker.

**

 Ana lies flat on the rocks. Her protective netting is spread over her. She blends perfectly, she knows; even the drones that occasionally whir by overhead aren't seeing her. The terrain is the mountains over the desert. The city stretches out below. Enough water falls from the morning mists that trees have established themselves here. There are high cliffs, a winding road.

She withdraws, moving far enough away that a low, weak signal sent in a specific direction will be missed by the receptors she's spotted here and there in the trees. "Equipment. Nothing consistent with pharmacy storage."

"Got it."

 She gets back into position to cover their way in. They are her family. They will be the path to saving Reyes, someday.

For now, they are simply taking an opportunity. They have found Talon; they are raiding Talon. It will be simple. Clean. Quick. It's another little hit. She doesn't expect to be-

The base is small, clean, modern lines. There's a few large windows on an upper porch. There's a woman in a white coat strolling through a side door. She knows this woman. Morrison held a gun on her barking for her to get out of the car, and was thwarted by the poison pill that had been tucked under her tongue. She'd been absolutely stone dead.

Now, she isn't.

Ana decides that this time, she will be, and aims for the head. As soon as Jack's assault hits the gates, she pulls the trigger. The doctor's body falls. Ana nods to herself and chooses her next target: a guard scrambling to cover them. "Jack. I don't know what's going on, but the doctor from Operation Hecate was here again. I shot her."

"Be ready to disengage," he says after a half-second pause. Ana goes back to covering them. Jack moves his forces more carefully. He would usually have stormed towards the base proper by now, but he holds them back, more defensive. Until Ana sees a dark, angry shape, edges glinting, boil up from below ground to cover another doctor's flight.

"Reaper," she says.

Jack draws a breath. "Disen-"

The man standing by Jack dies with a rifle's crack. Jack dives for cover. A bullet knocks him off a sideways step, but the sniper couldn't hit through the joins in his armor as he moved. Ana swears, moving to cover them. Whoever it is, he unerringly found the weak spot in Overwatch armor. 

For a moment, she sees a clear outline. Faithbreaker is on the roof. Then he's not. He's swinging down to the trees, faster than she can track in her scope. She judges the arc of his swing and leads him, but he's already dropped down to roll over the ground, come up, aim another shot. The part of her that worried she was fighting Jesse abates; nothing about that is McCree. She hears a crackle of static in her earpiece; someone was about to speak, and that someone is dead. Jack's team is withdrawing, but his relentless attack on their flank is making it easier for the security forces to approach. She's forced to leave Faithbreaker for a moment while she puts bullets in the two easiest targets, forcing the rest to move for cover.

When she looks back, Faithbreaker is looking towards her position, vanishing into the trees. Reaper is still shielding a doctor with his armored body.  

Ana moves. She wants an angle on that doctor, but she's cautious of a sniper battle that will allow Talon to flank her position. She moves, circling behind a ridge and coming up behind a low scattering of boulders.

"Ana!" Jack snaps. "Where are you?"

"On the way," she answers flatly. "Go." She keeps her gaze moving, sweeping for any-

-she drops and rolls. The shot cracks over her head. _I don't think so, child_ she thinks, firing back once. He's moving behind two thin tree trunks. She doesn't miss. Wood cracks in front of his face, sprays into that bulky, black visor. He turns his head to the side, leaning away.

He leans too far.

His head crosses just far enough in front of the point of her scope. Ana pulls the trigger, and watches with satisfaction as the visor breaks. Part of it dangles. A hand comes up. The rifle falls from it. Ana narrows her eyes. Was that surrender? Did the bullet go clear through that damned headgear?

Jesse McCree rips off the hanging bit. There's blood streaked down his face. He looks much younger, clean-shaven. His expression is perfectly blank. Ana freezes. She can see him laughing under Gabriel's arm, she can see him gleefully swinging Fareeha into the air with a whoop, she can see him frowning, passing Jack a water bottle under the scorching sun, she can see him any way but this flat, emotionless stare.

Because she saw the rifle drop, because she has just been in a sniper battle, she forgets what _Jesse McCree_ means _._ Because he was her friend, she hesitates.

In that time, he draws his pistol, swings it up - fastest draw she knows, faster than she can move - and fires.

The world turns red. She rolls back, screaming. It is long moments before she is able to think, to roll over. Pain blinds her, and she sobs, reaching for her sidearm. Nearly fires a sleep dart into her leg to end it, but she remembers in time _capture_ and pulls all her healing shots from their little pouch. Jabs them into her side. She has no time or strength to take her shattered rifle. She leaves it, crawling off the ridge.

There is only an empty hiss in her earpiece. She is afraid to touch the ruined side of her face. Biotics have spared her, and it feels like the shot went through her cybernetic eye and blew it through the side of the socket. Shrapnel struck the earpiece and her ear. The damage must have been easily mistaken for a killshot by someone watching with the naked eye. Jesse will not be looking for her.

More importantly, Jack thinks her either dead, or taken by Talon.

Ana goes through her pouches. She has three more healing darts. She palms the first. It will be her reward for getting halfway down the mountain. That, or it will be her prevention for falling unconscious until Gabriel searches for any survivors. She remembers Jesse's blank face. Easily, death is preferable.

Ana lifts herself off her belly and staggers further from Talon, into the vague stretch between base and city.

**

Angela Ziegler stands over her datapad. Waits. Reaper and Faithbreaker have orders to search for survivors. They have orders to capture. Several bodies have been recovered. There are a limited number of things it is safe to get as transmissions in the heart of Overwatch, but data blended with patient data is worth the risk. Bars of DNA have been sent to her, coded carefully as part of ink pollution on the side of otherwise unimportant files; she is decoding them and running comparisons with the Overwatch database to find out who Talon has killed.  So far, Ana is a blank.

This wasn't supposed to happen. This wasn't supposed to happen. She just might have killed Ana. She told them to alert her - she thought she was embedded deeply enough in Jack's plans - she thought she still had all the pieces in place - 

"Doctor-" says a diffident voice behind her. She drops her datapad into her pocket and whirls. Genji. Always Genji, always with some new, miniature, unimportant request. 

"Get _out,_ " she snaps. Genji turns and goes. Angela seals the door behind him and pulls up her datapad again, waiting for the results to connect. Waiting to find if she has killed her friend. 


	7. Feint

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ana takes to vengeful haunting like she was born to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING FOR: BRAINWASHING
> 
> SURGICAL STUFF
> 
> ENTIRELY THEORETICAL BUT STILL KINDA HORRIFIC BRAIN ALTERATION STUFF
> 
> FUTURISTIC NEUROSCIENCE
> 
> If you are an actual neuroscience expert you might find this funny, who knows.

Reaper glances down the stairs into the hidden bunker and escape tunnel. The scientists and doctors there are familiar, huddling and debating, sending out messages with flashing fingers. He turns away. Torchbearer has sent them orders already. He had his own opinions on his role in the fight; he was used as a kind of mobile barrier when he could have -

He dismisses it. He has his orders.

Faithbreaker is up on the ridge, looking into the forest. Reaper changes course. He can see something on the ground glinting where Faithbreaker had tried to take cover. He picks up a chunk of visor. The light catches in the three lenses positioned along its curve. Useless. Blind. He drops it, climbs up to stand by Faithbreaker.

There is a pool of blood at their feet. Drag marks. He glances at Faithbreaker and tugs on his shoulder. Faithbreaker resists. He pulls again, harder. This time, Faithbreaker concedes, walking with him down into the base yard, towards the security forces throwing body bags onto the incendiary supplies. They are given second looks. Everyone knows their roles or has their orders, and the behavior of the two is not second-guessed.

The intruders started a few fires with their weapons. Reaper tests a piece of charred wood for heat, breaks it off and crushes it to powder in his glove. The cut on Faithbreaker's face will scar. Infection risk, no worse. Faithbreaker has traded the visor for a typical pair of night-vision goggles. He's torn off some of his sleeve and tucked it into the band to slow the bleeding. It's a surprise, a gaudy note at the side of his face, like a bloodstained flower.

Talon's forces continue to give them a berth. They look at Reaper with suspicion. They look at Faithbreaker as if he is there for him to look at. Reaper is not quite sure what he is objecting to; Faithbreaker has always been like this, and doesn't even glance at them. But he drags a thumb through the powdered charcoal in his hand and swipes it over Faithbreaker's cheekbone. Faithbreaker holds perfectly still. Reaper wonders what he is thinking.

Holding his own thoughts in close, letting them twist around each other like a suspended snake, he rubs his thumb over the other side of Faithbreaker's face. Drying blood smears. That's fine, it will hold it longer. He covers Faithbreaker's shoulder with a swipe of his palm. A few gritty flecks fall and catch in his brows. Reaper drags a dark line down his nose, bumps it once with the side of his hand to flatten the powder over tanned skin. Traces his chin. The charcoal is nearly worn out of his drawing hand. He turns the other glove over, letting charcoal sift down in a hissing cloud.

He presses that hand against Faithbreaker's throat. A few gazes catch as he drags his hand down the bared stripe of Faithbreaker's chest, leaving it black and dusty. Turning, Reaper whips off his coat and flips it over Faithbreaker's shoulders.

"It's yours," Faithbreaker attempts to refuse.  

"You let a wounded sniper escape. We'll be searching at night. It won't shine. Wear it." He turns. A soldier is standing, watching them with wide eyes. Reaper extends a hand to her. She passes him the netgun. He swats it against Faithbreaker's chest and holds it there until the man accepts it. When he starts walking, Faithbreaker follows easily behind him.

The mountainous forest helps them. Fall has been here long enough that the leaves have been coming off the trees, trapping what moisture there is underground. When she stumbles, she leaves a wide swath, and the damp earth looks different against the rest of the forest. They pick up the trail.

Reaper notes this is something else learned long ago. Something learned in harmony? They don't need to speak. Reaper stays close, reading the trail, stopping and waiting whenever he thinks he's lost it. Faithbreaker stays back and to the side, where he won't add footprints to the path if Reaper needs to double back, but able to keep watch. If the sniper was too injured to go far, it is entirely possible that she is crouched down, watching the way she came, waiting for them to come within range of her sidearm.

They move steadily. Faithbreaker clicks his tongue into the comms once, jerks his head to the side when Reaper glances back. Reaper can see a blob hanging from roughly needled branches. He shakes his head. Lifts his arm, casts his hand to the side as if throwing something. She is simply too weak to keep from stumbling every so often, leaving wide, dark scars in the leaves, and tried to lead them off her trail. Splatters and streamers of blood turn to the occasional splash, then one or two drips on bronze leaves. Once, Reaper sees a glint. He stops, pointing to it. Faithbreaker comes back with an empty syringe. By the shape of it, it is meant to shoot from a gun. By the last of the gold streaks on the inside, it held biotics. Reaper hisses in annoyance, but sticks to the trail.  Biotics cannot restore everything; eventually, without rest and refueling, collapse and death will come to even someone whose injuries have been sealed. The sky loses its sunset luster. The forest around them fades from vivid greens to dusky grays. Stars come out.

They reach the road. It's a pathetic side split, narrow and paved, but the drones patrol it and have not caught her. Faithbreaker and Reaper could part ways to search. But there is still a strong chance that she is lying in a pile of leaves, knowing she will not live to dawn, waiting for one of them to come near. Separating from Faithbreaker flies against the priorities he was given. He shakes his head and signals that they are done with a sharp cut of his hand.

The mission is over. Words start to wear their way through his mind, back towards his throat. He leads Faithbreaker back into the trees. Halfway back to the base, he stops. "Rest." Faithbreaker snorts a little through his nose. Reaper wasn't kidding. He pushes Faithbreaker with a light shove to his shoulder. Faithbreaker settles down on a fallen log. Reaper sits beside him, going through his belt pouches until he finds medical tape, wipes.

"It's tiny-"

Failure and a poor hunt have left him feeling rasped. "Shut up." Faithbreaker presses his lips together, eyes narrowing. Reaper settles it by taking his night-vision goggles and plucking away the bit of sleeve. There's no reaction to either, besides Faithbreaker's eyes widening as he tries to adjust to new blindness. Reaper shakes his head and wipes the blood away. The sudden removal of the rag has started the bloodflow again. The edges of the wound are puffy with the delay of attention. Reaper steadily clears a strand of hair away. Faithbreaker stares straight ahead.

This feels familiar. Reaper struggles to place it. Not the soft pushes of the cloth or the steadiness of Faithbreaker's acceptance. Not the small rites of first aid. Not the tanned skin clean of charcoal dust. He sets those aside. The cut is deeper than he expected. The bullet forced a metal edge deep into the flesh, until it was stopped by bone.

Faithbreaker is not as strong as he is, they both know. His system is not as resilient. He tires more quickly, he stays injured for longer, his muscles give up a heavy task before Reaper completes it. Reaper pulls his glove back on. He thinks about killshots. About vulnerabilities. About the softness of Faithbreaker's lips below the edge of the visor. The stretch of throat to shoulder. The flesh and bone hanging in the span of his shoulders. The constant pulsing of his heart, the flex and yield of his lungs.

The blood still spilling down the sides of his face from the cut under Reaper's fingers. With his other hand, Reaper digs for biotics. He comes up with a metal tube and a slim, rolling capsule. The tube is reusable, meant to be loaded into an injector. When he holds it up, he can see the gleam of biotics through the edges. There is a capsule already loaded. The free capsule tries to roll from his palm. It gives under his glove when he catches it. Faithbreaker jumps at the sound of metal popping. Bright gold oozes from around the claw on Reaper's thumb and starts to run down the side of the tube. Reaper drops the capsule back in the pouch. He pulls off his glove, eases biotics onto his thumb, and brushes it into the cut. He firmly holds the edges together and runs the tape tight over the skin. He flips the hollowed tube into the darkness. He can hear it slithering over leaves.

There could be a drone scanning them through the trees, but there's something to this moment he can't let pass. The words to bring Faithbreaker to compliance wander through his mind. He slips his thumb between Faithbreaker's lips, pressing a claw lightly against his tongue, as if warning him. He trails it across his lower lip, down the chin where he dusted charcoal to obscure him, touch only firm enough to be felt. Faithbreaker's chin comes up. They both know he has no armor against Reaper. They both know he cannot. Reaper's hand bumps the flaps of his collar aside. He trails his claw down to his breastbone, leaving a furrow of angry skin, and presses until there is a bead of blood.

Reaper stands, dropping the goggles into Faithbreaker's lap.

Reaper cradles the angry glow in his chest all the way back to base.

**

Ana does not have time to not be on her feet.

She curses herself for leaving her rifle behind. She forgives herself; better Talon have a broken prototype than have its wielder to break. She steals biotics from the hospital. She steals the pills she needs from a pharmacy, and barely evades the police. But "barely" is all she needs. Drugged but conscious, she takes off the bandage and grimly surveys the side of her face. She is fortunate that she had a lightweight, gel-filled, ultra-modern version of the cybernetic eye, or else she would have died with shrapnel in her brain. She picks the shattered, wire remnants of her cybernetic eye out of the tissue around them. Sets what remains of the bones as right as she can. Forces as much biotics into her bloodstream as is safe.

She lets herself heal, sleeping for as long as she can, then covers the injury with clean bandages. She must push through the pain. If Talon thinks she is at large, and dangerous, they will realize that something stops her from rejoining Overwatch. They will move after Fareeha. They will force Ana to come to them. She must become a ghost, and remain one, until the threat to her family is gone.

Ana tightens her grip on her pistol.

There is only one place she can think of to start.

The base that Overwatch tore apart looking for Gabriel is hollowed out and dark. Since the place had clearly been used for _some_ kind of medical work, the local government has plastered biohazard signals and markers everywhere, looted the copper and valuables, and left it at that. Ana searches without being entirely sure what she is looking for.

Then she shakes herself. What does she know? She knows that a researcher bit down on a poison pill the instant she was captured. She knows that Mercy wistfully talks about bringing someone back from death through next-level biotics technology. What if Talon has some way to preserve the brain for rejuvenation, while letting the body appear dead? Or what if their research runs along lines closer to what Mercy mentions?

What if they have done it, and that was why the woman threw her life away?

Well. Ana leaves the empty, echoing walls. If that were the case... where was the car? She walks. If that was the case, then around the time the woman was palming the pill, realizing something was wrong... she'd consider what secrets she was about to leave on her body.

Ana finds the spot the car had been idling. She moves to one side, the passenger side. She starts walking, slow, concentric circles.

A key fob. She picks it up. Rain has gotten into one. The other still has a gleam of light around the edges. It's live. She can use it. She keeps walking.

Her foot hits it under the leaves, and her heart leaps into her throat thinking she's carelessly finished it off. She fishes the datapad out from under the leaves. The battery is dead, of course. She takes it back to the base, sets up her little travel charger, and pops the case. She finds two devices meant to signal to an outside force, disables them both, and powers the datapad. As expected, it was wiped. Whatever trackers were on it, they are now inert.

Ana knows better than to give up now. Researchers and doctors are smart, and they can often be careless. All that she needs is for this datapad is to be put to one use, just _one_ use, that the techs did not expect, and-

-messaging. Ana smiles. The woman didn't want Talon reading all her messages, and she downloaded a little message programming without realizing that the wipe was set to destroy things the tech already knew about. Ana checks for logs. She lets out a long, slow sigh.  

The woman was recruiting a neuroscientist. Ana whips out her own datapad and starts running searches. Neither the name or the picture are familiar, but the information that the woman sent to prove her credentials gives Ana everything she needs to find her.

Hoa Nguyen. Prosecuted for unethical  human experimentation, with a fascination for chemical alteration of the brain, escaped from prison and vanished. Ana looks from the old picture to the new face, and wonders how much it cost. The last thing Talon needs, and Ana goes through the conversation with interest. She has Nguyen's alias, but she hopes to find another pointer to lead her to the scientist before she steps into Talon's protection.

Ten minutes later, the wind sifts through the empty base. No sign has been left that anyone was ever there since the last official sealed down the tape and walked away.

**

Hoa Nguyen is so easy to find that Ana wonders if she's being baited.

Hoa has clearly been having a rough few days. When Ana breaks into her apartment, there's notebooks and stray data files scattered over every surface. Ana picks up one and moves it back and forth until her eye has adjusted to it. She frowns. It looks as if Hoa has found missing time in her week. Has she been testing something on herself? It's definitely the reason why Hoa was so easy to find.

There's too much to go through. Videos furtively taken of conversations with Talon agents, which Ana watches with enormous interest. Reports, which Ana can understand to various degrees, about...

Ana swallows. This appears to be Talon-provided research on human subjects. She skims until she sees FAITHBREAKER and REAPER. Then she goes and gets Nguyen. Ana collects as much as she can find and takes it out to the car. Hoa received a directional module to put in her car so that it would drive itself to a destination of Talon's choosing. Since she will be getting in the car, and doesn't want the car to be taken over by a virus and carry her off, locked in, Ana runs it through a scrubber. She is not surprised to find that it wrecks a program that would have overridden the door locks.

Damn Talon.

Hoa is unconscious on the seat beside her. Ana readjusts her so that her hair is completely hidden beneath her luggage and her coat.  She checks Nguyen's datapad. Locational trackers. She shuts them off and tosses the datapad on the seat.

Time to collect as much as she can, then wake Nguyen and force her to cut a deal. Ana starts the engine. She leaves the datapad alone. She picks up the reports for REAPER first, and starts her own datapad. She's going to need to look up one hell of a lot of terminology, she can tell already.

Four hours later, she has decided against cutting a deal with Nguyen. Anyone who can read this and think it interesting enough to help out is an enemy of the humanity that Ana has worked so hard to protect. Ana realizes her jaw aches from how hard she has been clenching it. She takes a long, deep breath. If only there were time for tea. She takes another painkiller instead.  

The missing time concerns her. Talon might already have put trackers, or vital detectors, on Nguyen. Ana drugs her to unconsciousness and dumps her in the car. She slips the directional model into the console and picks up Nguyen's datapad.

A chat window flies open immediately. She takes a deep breath, then quickly clips it to a one-way data dump to save the chat log.

Time to be a scientist.

__

ORDR: Well. Look who's showed up. Welcome. You must be on the way.

EE11: We hope you're feeling well. We haven't seen you for a little while.

ORDR: I hope your interview put your concerns to rest.

EE11: Hey! Look who it is! Please ask any questions - I know it must be overwhelming.

GP20: I'm still reading over what I was sent. It's amazing. I don't know what to think.

__

Ana flips through Talon's documents with one hand, looking for any connection between Nguyen's alias and "GP20" that she could use to decode other names. She can't see anything.

__

ORDR: It is a typical sensation.

EE11: We'll help with that! I missed your interview - have you met Torchbearer yet?

GP20: Not yet. But the car is moving fast.

__

Ana feathers the brake.

__

EE11: You'll like her. Everyone does. Well! Is there anything we can clear up? You said at the end of the interview that you needed some time to think, and since then... well, there just hasn't been a chance to talk about it.

EI44: We do like her! Of course, I just got another incident where I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for her. We're starting to wonder about the long-term effects of that, to be honest.

GP20: I was wondering about temporary uses... there's a lot of potential in the little shifts in personality made by the procedure. Outgoingness before a meeting, or a boost in confidence before a presentation.

ORDR: Well, we haven't been able to tell how permanent our changes are, because the mind is constantly changing in the background as new experiences come in and old ones remain constant, or fade away. What we think of as the person is really just a floating construct over a shifting sea.

WM15: Very poetic.

ORDR: I tell my students that free will is an illusion, but nobody understands what I'm saying. Perhaps one day.

WM15: It's the new researcher! Welcome aboard.

WNE11: RE: temporary: It depends on which method we're talking about. The Faithbreaker technique is basically a series of tiny, rolling, nanite-induced lobotomies that allow free space for programming, then are restored over time to lock it in. You need differently programmed nanites to keep isolated tissue from dying, and to prevent neural reconnection before you're ready for that tissue to get back online. But with them, you can temporarily shut down and restore all kinds of capacities - critical thinking, for example. Once an idea is part of someone's mind, it's very difficult to detect that without extensive interviews with the subject... much less deprogram it.

EE11: We keep using 'deprogram.' Torchbearer's going to hate that.

EI44: For good reason! We're not Omnics.

ORDR: Just... exploiting our organic similarities.  

WNE11: But that means that the lobotomies aren't like large-scale ones. You're disconnecting part of the brain. Over time, the gaps will be bridged, if they're small enough. But you still caused some tissue death by creating a gap... so how much of the 'person' went with it? What's come back? If it comes back gradually over time, but the subject has kept changing in the meanwhile, are they the "same" then? Who knows?

ORDR: Faithbreaker has had some massive personality adjustments. We could reconnect some of them, but we've already adjusted other areas that might override when we bring them back online. We can't predict how much correction will be required. We're monitoring.

WNE11: I did the bulk of the Faithbreaker nanite work. Torchbearer pushed the project over to finish on Reaper terms. That... that is an entirely different story.

EE11: Which I can talk about. WNE11 did Faithbreaker's heavy lifting. I got Reaper's. We did targeted neural pruning with lasers, but the damage was still enough to impair him. We used stem cell techniques to restore plasticity, then grew back what we had to in order to keep him functional. We were able to encourage pliability as we went. We were able to preserve a lot of skills that way. We still didn't have what we wanted: gradual, undetectable change. But we're geniuses, it worked. Previous versions were wasteful.

ORDR: "Wasteful" was worse than just minor degradation. Some of them deteriorated so much that we had to scrap entire projects. So being able to burn out, and grow back, has led to amazing results. The damage was obvious with other projects. With Reaper, talking to him, you'd never know.

WNE11: You've been quiet for a while. Questions?

GP20: How functional are they now?

EI44: Completely!

EE11: Completely.

WM15: Completely.

WNE11:  Totally.

ORDR: Comp fine

ORDR: I'll be late to this answer but I'll give more.  We were concerned for a while about all the areas we couldn't touch.

GP20: I'm listening!

ORDR: Well... it's basic neural impulse behavior: if you activate one area, the impulses activate the areas on the edge of it. So tracking down exactly where a memory is? It's like hunting a ghost. If I don't want to destroy more than I have to, I might decide it's not worth trying to figure out where, depth and placewise, the activity is coming from.

EE11: So if you take Reaper, strap him to the sensors, and say his former name, you get a response. It's faint, from a lot of areas, but it's a reaction anyway. For obvious reasons, we've purged it as best we can. It's an artifact.

WNE11: You get the same thing, behavioral artifacts, when they interact. There's no reason for that. We were considering purging it, but in order to get that, we'd have to do an intensive rebuilding of their reward systems-

EE11: And when you start changing that, you're never sure where you end up. When a different candidate looked like she was going to be the acquisition for Faithbreaker's role... I'll let WNE11 tell it, she's lead for him.

WNE11: Thanks. We were concerned about the ability of the other candidate to complete her goals. We were planning to create a link between mission success, and reward centers. But you need the right candidate, with the right structural details through the brain, to bridge that with our techniques. When we investigated, we found both assets were terrible candidates for that. Fortunately, they don't need incentives. They came preconditioned to follow orders. We just ran around the goalposts. Only our orders are the "right" ones.

GP20: _

__

Ana stares at the screen, trying to keep her composure. She can feel her fingers trembling with the need to threaten. To put fear into them. She tries to pretend she is the neuroscientist snoozing at her side.

__

GP20: Sorry! Typo! Go on.

WNE11: Um, artifacts. Right. They have no reason to "know" each other. Most of that was in areas we were targeting anyway, since we needed their loyalty. If you look at Faithbreaker's brain in particular, there's gaps in the activity where chains of microareas can't light up. They're disconnected. But there's a boost in activity clustered around them anyway.

__

Oh, Jesse. She can't read any more of this. She moves to one thing that was mentioned. They seem to think it could be involved in reversal.  

__

GP20: So what's all the parts about the Torchbearer interference?

EI44: Well, Torchbearer is working on a massive... call it an emergency button... in case we get suddenly and terminally injured. And guess what? By pure accident, she tested it on one of us when Overwatch crashed the party. So now we're all in, and let me tell you, it's been a lifesaver. Ha! Restorer. Last time, this sniper bitch shot me in the head. The head! I damn near didn't come back from that, too, Torchbearer needs the cellular death to have minimal advancement. Even something like submersion in water, or hot temperatures, can destroy the balance. Thankfully, my colleagues put me in cryo and evacuated my body.

ORDR: And we all agreed not to talk about this, or explain it as freely as you are, so my concern about long-term side effects are mounting.

EE11: Do what I do: don't die. Of course, since Reaper's mainly my work, he listens to my orders first. If you want a bodyguard, get to be an 11.

GP20: I don't know what to say.

WMNX: Imagine if Faithbreaker or Reaper were to regain functionality right when the enemy thought they were destroyed. They're both capable of crushing surprise attacks.

EI44: And it would prevent further trauma to us! Which I'm excited about, believe me.

ORDR: Even I have to say, I'm excited. Not so excited that it's essentially locking us in a permanent _status quo_. But don't let me dampen the party. At least we have a source of warning for most Overwatch attacks. We'll just have to be faster.  

GP20: But the interference?

EI44: Well, we have no idea how much would be regenerated. Torchbearer is as protective of Reaper as she's been of all our assets. Imagine if she revived Reaper from a massive disruption... and we'd also lost every bit of progress.

ORDR: Unthinkable!

WNE11: I think about it sometimes. When I need to be awake all night.  

EE11: We get a lot of protection, a lot of leeway, from the higher-ups. As long as they're ready for the cause-critical missions, Torchbearer can direct us, and the assets, however she wants. But they won't save us if we let Reaper loose at this point. They'll just let him take us out, then start over with smarter researchers.

GP20: What's your plan to prevent it?

EI44: dont fuck this up guys

ORDR: Come look at the stars with us!

EE11: Come look at the stars with us? Come look at the stars with us. Come look at the stars with us, Come look at the stars with us I think that's all the variants.

EI44: come look at the stars with us Mostly, we need a new subject! Who's had some minor alterations. We can tell Torchbearer there was an accident, and see what we get.

WNE11: Come look at the stars with us!

__

Ana stares at the screen. She glances at Nguyen's sleeping body, thinking: _anteater. pluto_. So that was why Hoa was missing time.

__

EE11: ...

EI44: which of you assholes fucked up

EE11: getting reaper

ORDR: nobody panic

WNE11: getting faithbreaker

EE11:  Come look at the stars with us? Come look at the stars with us. Come look at the stars with us, Come look at the stars with us

EI44: Why did we pick something so goddamn annoying

EE11: if she just looked away from the screen we can't let it scroll off

EE11: how are you assholes not thinking of this

__

Ana starts typing. She pauses. Perhaps silence is more terrifying than anything she can say.

__

WNE11: Fuuuuck okay. Uh. Guys? Trackers? Off comms _now._

__

Ana laughs viciously. She's nearing a bridge. She flips the datapad over the side. She overdoses Nguyen and waits until she's sure, then weights her body and sinks it into the river, trusting water damage to degrade it by the time Talon gets it out. She would have preferred to give her to Overwatch. This has all become much too risky for that. The chatlogs will have to do, when she can figure out how to get them to Jack around this "source." 

In the meanwhile, Ana Amari throws the directional module into the river, and flees for her life.


	8. Double Take

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for thought.

Fareeha is sobbing into Jack's coat. Jack is standing quietly, lips pressed together, staring down at the top of her head. He's stroking a large hand ineffectually over the top of her head. Mercy stands by quietly. Fareeha is not much older than Angela was when she lost her parents.

He should have been ready to face Reaper. Should have prepared for it more. It wasn't Reaper's weapons that had forced him back. It was Gabriel's slow turn of his head as he assessed Jack and his team, that patient, crawling scan of an enemy force. He hadn't been choosing his line of attack against Jack alone; he'd been choosing how he was going to take them apart.

With Jack's team already pulled out of position, falling back to the vehicles, there hadn't been a choice. 

Jack can't tell either Fareeha or Angela a lot, right now. Part of him remembers Ana's relentless planning, the way she always paused to find a route out. He remembers that crack of a pistol, with a woman's scream of pain. Remembers the hissing static of her earpiece. The antenna for it was tipped forward, glued over her temple. Damage to it was a sure sign of impact to the head.  

He has no idea how long it would take someone to drug her into working against him. Maybe Talon had Jesse from the moment they got a needle in him. Maybe they were just using all that time before they gave him back as misdirection.

They'd pulled back, gotten eyes on the compound, watching for anyone being taken prisoner. Ana had been wearing camo designed to keep her from being detected, which cut against them. They'd attacked as soon as Talon got into the air, forcing down their medical carrier. All they'd found was wounded Talon, most of which were still lively enough that he'd had to finish off a few trying to pacify them. They were still searching for where the escape tunnel came out. 

Either way, he revoked Ana's security clearance, had Athena and Winston put in alternate programs if anything that could be contact from her came in.

Jack stroked Fareeha's hair.

He had a low certainty: Ana was still undefeated. 

He glances around. There had been someone else in the room. Who?

"I want my mom."

"I know. She's smart as hell. Remember that."

Wasn't important.

**

The little delivery drone comes in the infirmary through a spiralling metal aperture. Genji's flip carries him in behind it. He lands softly on his toes and the fingertips of one hand. He stays low, out of sight of Athena's cameras. She is obligated to report if anyone goes into Angela's sanctum.

He has no idea what he's looking for. He knows Dr. Ziegler is in some sort of trouble. The little drone, slowed by his sabotage, is dutifully drifting forward with the day's stock. Genji goes first to the papers to be shredded. There's a huge stack there. The thickness and color are familiar: this is what Angela moved her datapad beneath when he came in. Maybe it's what disturbed her. He checks the topmost sheet, memorizing hospital name and country. There are only a few patients. He notes the names. There's heavy ink splatter on most pages. He wonders why the hospital didn't send proper records.

There's a clicking noise. He slides into the little side bay filled with display panels and looks over the screens. Mercy left a program to analyze DNA of the bodies bagged behind a curtain: the soldiers from Talon. She's comparing it with Overwatch databases to see if they have killed anyone of note. Red letters stand on the screen as each search completes.

NO MATCH FOUND

NO MATCH FOUND

NO MATCH FOUND

He moves away, prowling further through the infirmary, looking around for anything that might guide him to the source of Angela's trouble.

There's a _beep_ and he looks behind him. He can see floating, green letters reflected in another screen.

TCH

And there the letters end. Far to the right of the empty space, the empty eyes of the Blackwatch logo stare, distinctive even in blurry reflection.

The drone is starting to turn and go the other way.  Genji casts another glance up. One of Athena's cameras is rotating. He dives, rolls under a table, and comes up again. This time, he looks for the rack of emergency datapads that various hospitals have provided to Mercy. He has to spend precious time waiting for Athena's camera to turn away. He rolls around a cabinet and looks up at it. He was expecting to have to play a logic game for later. There's no need. There's no mystery about which datapad it could be: none. Every slot is full. They're all the wrong size.

Thwarted, he looks around. He sees closed cabinets and locked drawers, and he doesn't even know what he's looking for. Genji crosses over the floor again, just behind Athena's camera, and slides around to get in position. When the little droid hops out through the aperture, he follows. By the time Athena picks him up, he is several hallways away. He gives her camera a little wave as it stops and focuses. Athena is used to him, and does not even verbally respond, just swings the camera on its way again.

He comes through the door again. Mercy is looking at her datapad. It's the big, Overwatch one, and he pauses. He was going to chat for a while, but Fareeha is asleep on the couch and Jack is staring at a display as if he can wring answers out of it by glowering. He backs out.

**

Faithbreaker is two steps behind him. Reaper walks steadily. They are under a high, glass dome. Neither of them speak the language, although Reaper can feel his mind struggling to break apart the sounds and differentiate the words. When he glances back, Faithbreaker is strolling more slowly, with loose-hipped elegance. People's gazes follow him. His visor has been poorly repaired, and rests open on his face, showing everything from brows down. As always, he does not seem to notice, or mind, the eyes that linger over him. Today, the catsuit is a gleaming greenish-white that does not favor his skin.

"Hurry up." It is a sealed Talon factory. Nobody gets in, or out. The marketplace is simply something for the families of workers and scientists to do. They will grow old and die without ever seeing the outside of the dome. Reaper is not sure why this bothers him, but the thought dances in the back of his mind until he firmly sets it aside for other problems.  

"Right behind you." There is the snap of a rind breaking. He glances back to see Faithbreaker tearing thickness from some kind of citrus fruit.  The man pops a segment apart from the others and waves it under his nose with a faint, faraway look.

Reaper slows.

"Anything?" he asks when they have gone into a stretch with fewer people, still between the noise of the marketplace and the banging of the armory ahead.

"Sunlight on sand." Faithbreaker flips the segment between his lips, presses down, tips his head back and catches it on his tongue. He savors it for a long moment before swallowing. "Want some?"

Reaper pushes his mask up slightly and holds out a hand. He closes his eyes when he bites down, pulling the scent into his nose. He remembers the gleam of sunlight on a counter and a woman's voice. No words. He has the feeling it was a long time ago. Besides that, it's just a bright, sweet taste. He swallows. The shade-of-memory is gone.

Faithbreaker slides another segment into his mouth, teasing it with his tongue, eyes half closed. Reaper steps in between him and a gawking woman on her way to market. Faithbreaker's sensuality is easier to ignore when his face is covered. He's also more aggressive today. Reaper understands. Faithbreaker does not change his own clothing, tactics, and equipment; he simply adopts what he's told. And he is being told to change again. 

The peel skips over the packed earth as they reach the armory. Reaper steps in. The armorer's assistant is a hard-eyed young woman with chestnut skin and elegant, long braids. Reaper glances at her workstation and wonders if she has ever seen the sky. She wordlessly steps back, not wanting the trouble they bring. Her eyes hang on Faithbreaker. Reaper steps between them.

"That's it?" he asks as neutrally as he can. She is a small piece of the machine around them. She can do nothing but what she is told.

Faithbreaker takes off the black visor, leaning back to hand it to her, and pulls the new one over his face. It's beige, and it doesn't have the multitude of lenses the other one does. He picks up a band of armor and shakes out the buckles. The assistant sets the visor under a bright nest of clear lenses and moves to help him.

Faithbreaker's new armor: shoulder plates, plate over his upper back, wide band over his stomach. The helmet at least covers the back of his head. Reaper sweeps his coat off and stands beside him, arms at his sides. He doesn't think he needs to say anything.

"Gauntlets?" he asks finally, when it is clear she will not say anything.

"Not part of the approved design."

Reaper picks up his coat and waits while Faithbreaker is relieved of his gauntlets. With it goes the cable launcher that he used with a grapnel. Instead, he receives armored gloves, a modified version of the launcher, and a new wrist piece to power it. The gas packets are left with his pistol, but added to that, three shock grenades Reaper suggested.

Reaper nods. That, at least, is better. He looks down the long stretch of Faithbreaker's chest to a tiny crust of blood, the spot left by Reaper's claw.

"We should practice," he says. Faithbreaker falls in beside him, easily. He has no criticism for what he has been told to wear. Reaper sweeps his gaze around the room. He walks for the door with his coat over his arm.

**

_The wind casts petals down around Genji in a gentle rain. He looks around the little wilderness. Small, flowering trees are moving towards the growing season. He is too disturbed to meditate. Perhaps thinking will help._

Leaves rattle in the breeze past Ana's feet. The tropical heat bathes her. She exhales deeply in the tiny garden. She stands in a garden outside a ruined house, listening to insects buzz and sing. She needed to lay out the puzzle so that she can fit the pieces she learned from Hoa's disastrous first-day job chat.

_"I don't understand," Genji says aloud._

"Start with what you know," Ana says. "This started when Gabriel Reyes was assigned to take down Talon. Very quickly, he was mobilizing all his forces, reorganizing his spies' orders, moving agents around the globe. He reported that this was a larger problem than requested and asked for more resources. Winston, Jack, and Angela all moved to assist. However, for some reason, Gabriel was unable to land the blows he wanted. Even on an operation he'd planned for a year." Ana stops. "Something has been wrong about this from the start." She holds up a finger. "What?"  

_"This all started when Agent Jesse was kidnapped." Genji stops. "No. This all started when Commander Reyes began to provoke Talon. Commander Reyes is a formidable tactician, and Talon is a loose organization that must be possessed of several tacticians." He is far enough from the base, into the wild, to feel confident nobody hears him. Zenyatta is preparing for the Shambali's public ceremony, and Genji is having a hard time settling down to meditation. He is trying to blast away energy with thought.  "Yet, he never made progress. Why not?"_

"However they did it, Talon also intercepted the LaCroixes." She pauses. "Angela reported that they died from the collapse of the tunnel. However, there is another possibility: Jesse shot them both and dropped the tunnel on them. Probably a dry run, Talon's test to see if their mind control had converted a good agent to their cause. The bodies were recovered, examined by Angela, and both were described only as affected by a mountain falling on their car. However, I believe Amélie was shot. I assumed that one of us was letting her experiences cloud her judgement. I only saw the body briefly." She puts a second finger up by the first. "But I believe something does not match."

_"He was gone for months before he approached Overwatch, and mentioned nothing whatsoever of any medical procedures during capture. Then Commander Reyes and Agent Jesse retreated to an undisclosed location, together. Jesse made a comment that made Gabriel think he'd been experimented on somehow. We have reason to believe Jesse's datapad was hacked. We have no other reason to believe that Commander Reyes' was. The security was very high, and Reyes and McCree were out of my sight. Yet, Talon was able to find them and neutralize them both. How did they capture Commander Reyes? How did they transport him? Drugs have unpredictable effects on his enhanced body."_

"Talon kidnapped Jesse, did complicated surgical procedures to his brain, released him," Ana lists on her fingers, "Gabriel took him to a safehouse. The location was highly secret, known only to Jack, myself, and Angela. Angela was actually planning on visiting Gabriel, but he disappeared the night before that meeting happened. It was discovered that Jesse's datapad had been hacked. Fearing discovery, he fled towards an undisclosed location. Somewhere along that path, he was intercepted by Talon, who had found him by..."

_"How would they know what drugs to use?"_

"Someone telling them. But who knew? Jack has explained that Gabriel's datapad was voluntarily destroyed, by Gabriel, who would have left the area. The only person who knew that they were even on the way was Jack. If Talon already had their claws in Jack, we'd all be sitting in a lab a year ago." Ana slams her foot against an empty, fallen birdbath. "This does not add up."

_"Gabriel Reyes and Jesse McCree were both remade, somehow, into being Talon's soldiers. I know that there is a technique that can assist with healing direct interference with the brain. Changes that would otherwise kill a man. Yet our expert is unwilling to discuss the possibility. Instead, she believes that it is drugs. Like Talon knew how to use the right drugs on Commander Reyes, they already had on hand every chemical required to enslave him. Yet he seems to function completely as normal. He fought Tracer with his usual skill. He was moving to oppose Jack with what Jack assessed as a clear mind. If Faithbreaker is Jesse, as Jack suspects, there are similar results even though the same drugs could not possibly work on both. My idea should not be dismissed."_

"However, I do know that Talon has had a source, letting them know where attacks would strike. This source has been blunting every one of Gabriel's operations from day one." She muses. "I would say that Jesse might have been taken very early, given that damned treatment, and returned... but even while he was gone, Gabriel was not able to make progress. Therefore, Jesse is ruled out. Jack..." she hesitates. "If Talon had Jack, he could simply have ordered Gabriel into a trap. However, since Jesse was able to seem just like his old self at times, there is a possibility Talon has a greater plan for Overwatch and he is compromised. In that case, I should remain out of sight."  Once more, she balks. She was about to make herself imagine Reinhardt as the source, although it makes her feel a little like a traitor, but at the idea of a greater plan, she stops.

_"I'm getting distracted from the obvious question."_

"There's a question I should have asked long ago."

_"What's upsetting Dr. Ziegler so badly?"_

"Why Gabriel Reyes?"

_"She's talking to someone who she is hiding from us. Who? Why? Why will she not tell us that she needs help?" Genji does not speak for some time. Finally: "but she would never harm us."_

"While the public sees him with less adoration than Morrison, he is still acknowledged as a savior of humanity, whose complicated schemes and long-term plans led to the exposure and defeat of active god programs and rogue AI-" she stops dead. "-and, in fact, if he were to step out of the shadows, with attacks on Omnics, he could eventually claim it was part of a master plan. He could turn the public to the side of Talon," she scrabbles for her datapad, "or just destroy their trust in Omnic groups. Who's most active right now in high-profile Omnic outreach?" Her eye widens before she's entered her question. "The Shambali."

_"I wish you were here to talk to, master."_

"I have to-" with the whirl of a coat and the scrape of a boot, Ana Amari is gone in the night. Eventually, the crickets start chirping again.

_Genji sits patiently, attempting to meditate._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Having trouble imagining Faithbreaker's armor? 
> 
> http://comic.playoverwatch.com/issues/overwatch/7/en-us/pages/9/9-3.jpg
> 
> http://comic.playoverwatch.com/issues/overwatch/7/en-us/pages/9/9-4.jpg
> 
> I don't blame you!


	9. Holding Pattern

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A lull.

King's Row is not what Faithbreaker had expected. He'd expected something... something richer? The buildings are old and narrow. Stony facades and the smell of old brick and mortar wash around him. It's foggy and raining. The conference has been postponed due to inclement weather. Faithbreaker doubts that rain is throwing off the city now. Something has spooked someone. This Tekhartha Mondatta seems stubborn. He is waiting for it to go forward. Faithbreaker itches to just go find him. Faithbreaker doesn't enjoy killing, but his purpose is larger than he is. He will not be stopped. Talon's mission has specifics that prevent this from being as easy as tossing scrap into a recycler.

Since they don't know when, exactly, they'll be able to move into position, Talon embedded them in King's Row and told them to create and maintain a cover among the sea of tourists. So this is cover. His hair's neatly tied back, and there's synthetic skin artfully glued over his face. (He can take it off later tonight. Talon's little artist will come through in the morning. He hopes she's not disposed of when it's time to go. She does good work.) Reaper is at his side.

They discussed what their roles should be, if they should keep their routines apart. Then their handler lost patience and went with the simplest cover. They are lovers come to see the Shambali, and are spending the delay exploring the city.

They walk along sidewalks. They stop in small parks. They glance up to locate cameras viewing the street, lean in to tell each other in soft, easy murmurs. Faithbreaker is interested to notice that their handler physically observes them, once or twice. He is not sure if Talon is reminding them of their job, or curious of their performance. Faithbreaker is careful. He always has been. He knows the rules: don't get sidetracked by media, tune it out; Talon will let them know what is important. Take his role and play it. Be ready.

It is not the first time he has been ordered to look over himself like an artist over palettes and mesh word/reaction/look/lean/touch with this man's. It is the first time that Reaper has been told to play the game with him. They learn how to say each other's alias with just the right inflections: not so richly that people around them spare the thought to judge them freshly in love, not so simply that they seem as friends. Reaper picks him up a new jacket because the one Talon provided is slightly too small. It helps. Faithbreaker's body language changes, flows like it wouldn't if he were wearing what Talon gave him. He approves of this: when the work begins, he wants to be a different person, armored and helmed. Stepped from nowhere.

Taking coffee at a little terrace at noon is a minigame of attention, learning to spot little opportunities to blend their cover. There is a larger game played around it. Their handler is on the street outside, and Faithbreaker thinks he did not intend to be seen. Faithbreaker does intend to be seen fucking up when they leave the terrace. He lets his expression fade into the empty screen that Talon has come to expect, lets his movements go fluid and precise. Reaper tries to bring him out of it, but is visibly impatient within fifteen minutes. Faithbreaker is sorry that he's costing Reaper minutes of cooperation. He cannot tell him. When he tries to put the thought driving him into words, it seems anyone could read it like treachery. He plays through his move by gut feeling, by the drive that tells him he should do nothing else. After all, if Talon wished to reshape him that deeply, they would have.

Their handler is waiting when they return to the hotel to report. He reminds them both of expectations, roles. He inquires of Reaper if he's lost his ability to regroup when his assigned partner is slipping. He lectures Faithbreaker for about one hundred forty seconds: a quarreling couple is memorable, a happy couple forgettable. Faithbreaker acknowledges. He slips into that warmer possibility like he were climbing into a catsuit. He thinks he has brought them extra room bef -

Caution is a buzz through his brain. Thoughts like that are dangerous. Conclusions can be drawn from all the facts that are true in opposition. Faithbreaker dusts the trail from his mind like grit off a table.  

 They stand on the riverside at sunset, waiting for the skyline to darken enough that they can go up to the roofs and learn those as effectively as they know the streets. The smell of wet cobblestones rises around their ankles. There's a thick fog coming down, chill and damp. First tendrils of it drape them, then the stores across the street start to dim. Because this kind of weather can interfere with a self-driving car's ability to detect people on foot, Reaper walks them to the railing over the river and leans a hip on it. Faithbreaker unzips Reaper's jacket and steps into it, pressing against the warm muscle of his chest. His scent through the strange city's is an anchor. Faithbreaker feels a thousand tiny things pop the surface of his thoughts and fizz away, too scattered and fine for him to grasp. Faithbreaker presses close until Reaper drops an easy arm around his ribs.

He doesn't like to think about what he lost. What he might have been before. If those still exist, they are past a charred stretch where there was nothing but fire, and he sees no landmark on the other side to guide him across. Talon pulled him up from the ashes and gave him peace within the rules. So that is what he has. But he also has this: Reaper's breathing, even, steady. Reaper's commisseration. Collab - no. Utter cooperation.

Since they are both Talon's, there is no harm in thinking he would gladly kill for Reaper. His fingers tighten on Reaper's ribs until the man strokes the back of his neck, bringing him back down.

**

 They went to a museum today. There was an art gallery. There were musicians. Every minute has felt like a gift. Faithbreaker has reported to his handler with utter punctuality, face clean of feeling. As they wish. He has been released again into the veins of King's Row. The streets are familiar now; he could navigate them in a fight. (He might.)

"We should come back tomorrow," Faithbreaker says. They stand in the late twilight on a street corner. "And get a book." There are gleaming download ports by shining title holograms. Those are going dim as the store drags further from closing time. Here and there, a few actual paper books stand on the shelves. (They will not come back tomorrow, he knows. They will not get a book. If they did, he would not read it, and it would be left behind.)

"Do you remember reading a book?" Reaper doesn't look surprised when Faithbreaker shakes his head. The skin is of different thicknesses over his face, with a little extra padding here and there to make him a different man. "I don't. But some of these... they sound familiar." 

A hovercar comes around the bend. Two Omnics and a human are inside the little bubble of warmth and dryness, laughing to each other. Reaper steps between Jesse and the car. Reaper catches his sleeve, tugging him to walk along. Faithbreaker pretends he didn't notice the moment. It's simpler to let Reaper obscure him.

They walk quietly towards the theatre. News is risky; Talon has ordered them to avoid newsfeeds. Some of the things Faithbreaker hears, he stores away to break down later. This is the kind of order he does not. But a theatre should be safe. Just entertainment.

"Did you want to smoke?" Reaper asks.

"We don't," Faithbreaker reminds him. The things the man forgets. Faithbreaker pretends to have forgotten as much. But he can remember a door opening, seeing Reaper in a machine, and feel a crawling sickness, a realization that this wasn't going to  end soon. He can remember being sent away. He can remember... he thinks he can remember Reaper throwing him, blood, pain, purpose. He can remember Reaper on a bed with him, trying to trace his unhealed edges, trying to comfort his pain. That was before Talon took Reaper and -

He feels his stomach lurch. He veers around the building. Reaper follows him, solicitous. Faithbreaker holds up a hand to keep him off. He swallows most of it down, but he spits, thick and bubbly, on the alley floor. Reaper pulls down a poster and drops it over the mess.

Faithbreaker follows his gaze when Reaper stands still. It's a weathered, torn poster. Recognisable on one side is a man with deep-toned skin and a near-shaved head. Fine lines scar the side of his face. He's handsome, he doesn't look quite like Reaper, but he's wearing a blue uniform and staring up at the sky. Faithbreaker squints, feeling like the ground is not steady under his feet. Back to back with him is another figure. Most of this one's head is gone. What remains is a gleaming blond curve. Not Faithbreaker, and he feels a curdling of hope. But then he looks at the letters.  

"-abriel Rey-" he reads softly.

"Gabriel Reyes," Reaper whispers, like the shadows could take the name from him if he's too loud. Faithbreaker tips his head. It doesn't sound any more or less familiar than the consonants: Abe. Ariel. But as it echoes in his mind, he knows that's it. He reaches out. Reaper's fingers catch his tightly.  

"Am I there?" He runs over the names. "nge" could be the actress or character. "Jess." Jessica? Is there a last name starting Uess? The next letter is too worn. "I don't think I'm there." Bile still jangles over the inside of his mouth.

"Jess," says Reaper, staring. "Jess. Jess." He looks at Faithbreaker with confusion. Faithbreaker shrugs. Reaper looks back at the blond back of the head, staring as if he can force it to take shape. He reaches for the posters beside it. Faithbreaker steps back, pulling. Reaper gives him a suspicious glance, confused, but Faithbreaker shakes his head. "If we pull them all down, anyone who looks will see something unusual. They might wonder." 

Reaper exhales, but they both know he's right. The only way it is safe to move is within the frame of Talon's expectations. Any unusual move and they're back for corrective treatment. Faithbreaker hooks an arm around Reaper's shoulders. He will spare him everything he can, after - what he did. What did he do? He's not sure, but just brushing near it makes him feel shaky again. He swallows.

When they leave the alley, the poster that had been on the alley floor hides the blank space behind. Scraps of poster are rolled up in Reaper's sleeve. Later, they shred it into a thousand pieces and drop it down a rain gutter, where trickles are flowing, washing leaves and papers and cigarette butts to the sea.

_Gabriel Reyes._ Faithbreaker glances sideways at him. It just looks like Reaper, to him. He wonders how he would feel if he had a second name. He watches the water swirl over the pavement. Reaper looks at him, tips his chin up, eyes narrowed. The synthetic skin doesn't crinkle quite right, Faithbreaker will have to tell him not to make that expression. "Are you all right?" Faithbreaker nods. Reaper doesn't look convinced. He pulls his scarf off, wrapping it around Faithbreaker's neck and up onto his face. Faithbreaker ducks his chin down into it. Reaper blinks, eyes widening like a piece just clicked into place, but he shakes his head when Faithbreaker looks.

They slip into the night, two tiny figures on the street, melding and merging with the others. They sleep uneasily on the bed, back to back, silent. When they wake, they are careful to stick to mundane talk about roads, traffic, weather.

Faithbreaker breathes a deep sigh of relief when they're out on the street again. He spots their handler on a rooftop cafe as they walk. The man is not making himself obvious, but Faithbreaker feels watched.

He pretends he didn't see. 

**

She wonders if this is how Gabriel got caught in the cycle of making things worse. How he blinded himself, and fell. She thinks she has. She can't, and she can't stop to think about it; there's too much that needs to be repaired. Too much to keep in motion.

Fareeha is sleeping in her room, having accepted a mild sedative. Mercy is sitting in the window, her knees folded, her arms resting on them. It's completely dark outside. The lights are dim. The bodies have been cremated. Her infirmary is empty and spotless.

So what's the solution? Does she give up? What other loss is she going to accept? Ana didn't deserve to get in a confrontation with Jesse, and Jack had been on a collision course with Gabriel. What if Ana had fallen earlier? Jack could easily have died, or killed Gabriel, certainly killed Jesse, trying to save her.

Or: Is Ana alive?  Every minute makes it less likely. Ana wouldn't leave Jack and Fareeha thinking she was dead. Angela has traded two minds and a life for a better world, and not actually moved that forward yet. Unacceptable.  

"Dr. Ziegler?"

"Hello, Genji," she says, looking up. She forces a smile. "I'm sorry I snapped at you."

He comes into the infirmary. "I'm worried about you."

It feels like she's swallowed a rock. "Everyone is very unhappy. I can't think of a worse time for Overwatch." She sniffs, and does not let the tears come.  

His head cocks. "Is someone, is anyone... bothering you?" His tone is very soft, as if he's concerned he's going to scare her. She feels her muscles tense. Tries to relax. "You've been talking to someone, but you have been withdrawn with us. Talking to this person always makes you act like something is wrong."

He's right. Guilt has been crushing, and his attention has always come at the worst moment, when she needed to manuever Talon away from them. She flicks through all the things that she fears, her own little catalogue of nightmares, for something that he would believe. Ever since Torbjorn's rifle, she has an easy one. "I think some of my research was stolen," she says. "I think it is being advanced."

She can see his body shift, a hunch from preparing to take a hit, to identifying what is aimed at him. "I thought that might be it," he says, pulling a chair over and settling down on it. "Do you think it was turned on Commander Reyes and Agent McCree?"

She reaches out to her staff and tosses it to him. "I'm not sure. This is..." she swallows. She has to lead him off the track, but there's only one thing that would be bigger, to him, than mind control. She is not a good enough liar to trick a ninja, so she does not lie. "It doesn't have to do with brain cells at all. It has to do with restoring life."

"How possible is that?"

"I... there are serious ethical considerations around testing it," she says. "I haven't even wanted to mention it. It makes people hope for so many things that I am not sure I can deliver yet. But when I was in the field with Gabriel, I know that my infirmary was visited many times, and once my prototype was moved from where I left it. It's possible someone did a detailed scan and created their own version."

"But you are sure it was complete enough to be near finishing?"

"Yes. It..." she watches him weigh the staff in his hands, finding its balance. "It was very near done. If it was stolen by someone who'd been spying on me enough to know the purpose, it could have been finished."

"Why would being able to raise the dead lead to Comm-" he stops. Genji settles back onto his chair. He rises almost immediately. She recognises the purpose in his moves. That was how he used to get up from her operating table.

"I will remember this," he says. His voice is completely different. "I will do everything I can."  

"Thank you," she says. She doesn't think he's listening. She watches him go. Well. Genji knows exactly the malleability that someone has when they think that they have died. She thinks she has just convinced an agent of Overwatch that Talon has begun killing them until they cooperate.

She overplayed that severely. This is going to backfire, and _spectacularly._ Talon is not going to be pleased about how thoroughly bases that Overwatch discovers will be diced, and there will be more deaths than ever before. On the other hand, she can move forward freely. She can think about what to do, where to guide this, how to make good on the sacrifices that she has made of her friends-

Angela sits heavily down on the windowsill.

**

Overwatch has an emergency message box that connects with the tip line. By UN decree, it is completely anonymous. Messages are read by Athena as they are typed, but entered one at a time for text limits. Data transmissions are forced down to miniscule sizes. Athena is monitoring when she receives an unusual transmission.

__

athena

i know you can read this

please pull it from the box so that only you continue to read this

i am a friend

it is important

it is vital

__

Five seconds pass. Athena has put all edges of her defenses on red alert. Winston is working at his desk, oblivious to her scrutiny, and she decides not to disturb him yet. If anything is sent that might be part of a hack, she will.

__

thank you.

connect me to winston or allow me to send a file

i have a text log that he needs to read. i have isolated the most important part

i am plugging it in now

__

"Winston," says Athena, "an anonymous source addressed me by name and asked for communications not to be logged. She or he is requesting to upload a file for your review."

"Any syntac-"

"Punctuation is being stripped, besides some reflex. Analysis of text patterns is progressing. Manners are noted."

"All right," Winston says, "pull it into quarantine. Let's see it."

He reads:

WNE11: I did the bulk of the Faithbreaker nanite work. Torchbearer pushed the project over to finish on Reaper terms. That... that is an entirely different story.

EE11: Which I can talk about. WNE11 did Faithbreaker's heavy lifting. I got Reaper's. We did targeted neural pruning with lasers, but the damage was still enough to impair him. We used stem cell techniques to restore plasticity, then grew back what we had to in order to keep him functional. We were able to encourage pliability as we went. We were able to preserve a lot of skills that way. We still didn't have what we wanted: gradual, undetectable change. But we're geniuses, it worked. Previo

__  
_Who are you?_

_Where did you get this?_

_How did you know? Are you with Talon?_

_Did you do this?_

_Did you have any part of this?_

_I will find you._

_We are going to find you._

__

Ana stands firm.

__

_No. I am not talon. but talon has embedded an agent in overwatch high enough to know every move its leaders are making._

_sometimes barely in advance or just as they move but with devastating consquences_

_I had to prove that I had knowledge and i had to show why i trust you_

_you are the only person in overwatch who doesn't have a human brain_

_no offense athena_

_so  i have some reason to think you cannot be talon's agent_

_but i can't prove who is_

_i am looking for your friends now, i want to stop them. i have reason to think that they are going to attack the shambali as talons next move on the board_

_it will have to be a public attack_

_i cannot protect the shambali alone. i need help. but i cannot ask overwatch to help because talon would be informed_

_please_

__

A tire ricochets off the wall and knocks over three lockers. Winston's fist hangs in the air only because Athena speaks, and he realizes what he is doing before he knocks his desk over.

__

_Who is the agent!_

__

She doesn't know if he's using text to speech or just typing, but she can _hear_ him shouting. Winston has his lab soundproofed, so that he can rejoice in a breakthrough (or cause the occasional meltdown of parts) without waking the base. But that's still a risk.

__

_dont let them know you know please think_

_I cant prove it and i would not be believed without proof. you already think its a trick_

_but someone is trusted who should not be_

_someone high enough, trusted long enough, that they can devastate overwatch plans_

_Maybe someone who Talon took, while we weren't looking_

_I believe i know but its based on things i know_

_i can't prove it and i need proof_

_but i know who would be able to say for sure_

_they would know_

_jesse mccree would know_

_gabriel reyes would know_

_because if i am right they have seen the agent again_

_we know they don't recognise us. we know they will fight us. but they are utterly loyal to talon and wont act against it. who wont they fight? the agent_

_i need help protecting the shambali but i am afraid that if you tell the agent you are coming Jesse McCree and Gabriel Reyes will be expecting us_

_if you come to protect the shambali they will attack, if you come prepared they will not win_

_but whoever comes with you_

_well see them react to that person_

__

There is a long silence. Ana glances at the series of boxes her datapad is plugged into. It's complicated, but it's not so complicated that Athena hasn't found the city she's in. Athena will pinpoint her eventually. She can't afford to be found; Jack cannot be shut out of some parts of Athena's logs, if he gets an idea he should look. 

__

_But if i tell or take several people someone will tell the agent. They will not be surprised._

____

She nods to herself and disconnects. Just taking the power out of the transmitter relay won't cut it, since two of them have safeties that keep a bit of energy washing back and forth. She has to stomp one so that it doesn't keep emitting a ghost. He is thinking now, and she doesn't want him thinking that she is trying to interfere in every step. He'll put thought into how to do this with whatever safety can be found. 

Winston isn't human. His emotions get the better of him. She is sure that she has put him through hell. Reading that was hard enough for her when she knew it was coming. Winston must be wounded. But he is also the only one she is absolutely sure Talon has not corrupted.

She hopes he brings Reinhardt.


	10. Confession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Talon makes a play.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not a dead match for King's Row in-game. Just add more buildings and make the square bigger, and you've got it.

He should have said something. They would have let him on the plane. His body can withstand the cold easily, but he still should have let them bring him into the warmth.

He is silent. The walls are not layered for comfort, and the thundering roar of the turbines and shrieking of the wind through the cracks makes it hard to think. Makes it easier to fall into meditative acceptance.

Eventually, he does stir enough to realize: he came back too soon. He came back before he healed. He came back because Overwatch needed him. Because Mercy needed him. Because Gabriel Reyes and Jesse McCree were taken, cut away, and he knows the pain of that.

He knows where Reinhardt and Winston intended to go. Not why. Why doesn't matter; he knows who is there. He accepted Overwatch, not as family but as... home, for a time, and he already knows the pain of having home turn on him. He may be needed to face McCree or Reyes before this is over. They have been wounded over and over as he was, and more. It's all too much, echoing endlessly through every crack in his defenses. He wants to listen to Mondatta's speech. Afterwards, he will talk to his master until he is ready to... to decide what to do.

The plane cuts through the night sky towards King's Row. Genji Shimada stays in the wheelwell, in his tiny bubble in the tumult, and lets his thoughts be the night sky.

**

 _Maybe it's two agents,_ Ana thinks.

 _Maybe it's Reinhardt,_ Ana thinks.

 _Maybe it's Mercy and Genji,_ Ana thinks.

 _Maybe it's not truly Mercy,_ Ana thinks.

She is piling a mouse's nest of doubt in her mind, she knows. Mercy vibrates with the need to heal, to ease pain, and every time she thinks of Mercy as a Talon agent she pictures those damned researchers and their damned - she stops herself. The best way to keep herself fooled is to let her emotions think for her.

 _I know Mercy either lied, or was mistaken about something she should not have been,_ she thinks. _That remains. It cannot be ignored. Cross them off, one by one. Test and prove, and whoever is left... well, that person is the agent._

**

It will happen tomorrow, and then King's Row is just a few specific streets in a dark dot on the map, a point on the curve of the earth.

As he lies awake in the dark, it occurs to Reaper that he's never lost an arm, but he can imagine the feeling now. Space. Inaction where he expects resistance and flex. He rolls his weight a little harder into the shoulder resting against his own. He knows where that expectation comes from:

_"Commander?"_

Once, he led many. He must have learned them, must have cultivated skills and ordered training, judged suitability and measured progress. Now... one. He finds this interesting. He pushes at that empty space, trying to determine anything about it. Nothing, of course. It's empty space. What is there to find? Perhaps if he throws something far enough, he will hear an echo. He flings the only thing he has.   

_Gabriel Reyes._

Every syllable acquired like a mantra. He wonders if he had a middle initial. A middle name. He wonders if knowing would help. He doesn't know if somewhere in his mind, there's a locked door, or a wall.

_Commander Gabriel Reyes._

Perhaps not a wall. He can feel there's... something there, so impenetrable his mind can barely find it, sliding over it again and again looking for a crack or join. Some part of him that knows the word _amnesia_ says: _don't try to force it_ which is about as useless as telling a smothering person not to panic. He wills himself to slow his thoughts. Thinks about the poster. Thinks about himself as a soldier. Thinks about standing with, back-to-back-

_Jack_

His eyes fly open. That's new. He rolls over and sits up, leaning over the sleeping man just enough to see his face. Closes his eyes. Open his eyes, listens to the answer of who that is:

_Faithbreaker_

No. They are not the same. He chants _jackjackjack_ hopefully in his head. Nothing follows with helpful consonants. He lies back. Overwatch was the woman with the blue-glowing circle on her chest. Overwatch was a gorilla. Overwatch was a sniper trying to kill Faithbreaker. Overwatch was a leader calling orders, face partly obscured, strong, heavy chin, pale skin. Now that Reaper is trying to fill in the face, there is an itching in his head.

Talon would not approve, he knows. The thought settles into place, crushing down some of the itch. But the fact is: undeniably, he has pushed Talon's bounds, for the man resting behind him. Has worked them just wide enough to stir within. Has disagreed, and has allowed himself to question. He thinks of an earthworm's slow, steady crawl: probe, find a crack, and then heave with every muscle it has.

Working toward...?

He rolls silently out of bed. The little bathroom is still tidy, although Faithbreaker has left water scattered over the counter. Reaper closes the door and flicks on the light. Looks at his face.

 _Reaper_ he thinks. Corrects himself. _Commander Gabriel Reyes._

_Reaper._

Patiently: _Commander Gabriel Reyes._

He fills a little disposable cup with water and leans against the closed door while he drinks it. Idly traces some of the scars. They are not as indetectable as the cosmetic lines on the actor's face. They're real. He can't remember getting any; not the ones on his face, not the scars he sees tracked down his body. Living, survival, healing. He's done this all before.

When he looks up, he sees a young man.

He can still see himself ( _Reaper)_ there when he moves, as his brain corrects, readjusts, accepts its visual signals and presents him with its own idea instead. When he's still, he sees himself as he was... he doesn't know how long ago. Overgrown hair, uncertain eyes, uneasy frame. Not a commander of anything but where his sneakers go in his closet. He leans forward, accepting what his mind is trying to tell him _(you were not always this)_ he thinks to himself. Crumples the cup in his fist and drops it in the trash. When he looks up, he sees only Reaper. _Commander Gabriel Reyes_ but he is weary, he feels rattled with doubt that he ever did the right thing in pushing against the limits Talon determined. He feels shamed. Shaken. He thinks he should stop. He flicks the light off. When he opens the door, what light there is through the curtains shines on his shoulders but does not reach his face. 

He sleeps, and dreams of fragments and whispers. _Jack_ he hears in his mind when he wakes up. It's his voice. He can't read what's in the tone. Faithbreaker's asleep. Reaper shoves at his shoulder. Swats his hair sideways, not hard enough to hurt, when Faithbreaker won't wake up.

Faithbreaker's voice is groggy and somehow richer, as if he were rolling the sounds from deeper in his throat. "Now, what'd you go an'..." Faithbreaker trails off again, hunching up one shoulder as if it will protect him in sleep.  Reaper wants to hear that again, but he's a little worried that Talon heard and, somehow, won't approve. He grabs Faithbreaker's arm instead, dragging him across the mattress towards the floor. Faithbreaker sits up and wrestles free.

They're dressed when there's a click at the door. They split up, prowling apart, backs to the wall, when it opens. Their handler steps in. They both semi-relax, moving back towards the center of the room as he closes the door. The man puts a case down and flicks it open.

"Hold him," he says with a jerk of his head at Faithbreaker. Reaper obeys. Faithbreaker is quiet in his arms. Reaper watches the man pull a needle out. He pushes Faithbreaker's sleeve up. The man offers a bite guard, which Faithbreaker flips between his teeth. The injection itself is over quickly, Faithbreaker's voice not even climbing louder than a grunt, and they're apart again like nothing happened. Faithbreaker steps into the bathroom, washes his face, and comes out with eyes a little red but nothing else changed.

Reaper stops himself from asking what that was. "What was that?" Faithbreaker asks, and is ignored. The handler's out again without bothering with further comment. Reaper has an idea that something was wearing off, but he's not sure what, or if it was even going to help Faithbreaker to remember anything if it did. He moves for the door. They know what they're supposed to be doing.

They know as soon as they step on the street that everything will happen tomorrow. It's in the increase in traffic, the busy preparations of storekeepers trying to make their shopfronts more inviting.

Reaper walks quietly. His head feels overcrowded, as if Talon left gauze in his mind while they were working. It feels like second nature to be watching for any of their agents taking their places on the busy streets, setting a routine like he and Faithbreaker. He wonders if there was a time when he wasn't holding Talon in the back of his mind.

They pass the empty buildings where their armor and weapons will be the next day. The block ahead is cordoned off. They change course, staying with foot traffic, and cut a larger track around the square.

Reaper catches a hint of movement in an upper window. The day before yesterday, it was empty, with nothing worth noting on the map they reviewed in the morning. Yesterday, it was empty, and Talon did not mark it as a hideaway. He pretends not to see, but he bumps Faithbreaker with a warning elbow and slows to a stroll. Someone bumps into his back, and he presses his lips together, pretending not to notice.

They don't have a chance to check the building until they've gone around the block. The back door is broken, and opens easily. They sweep it in total silence, working together, but there's nothing there but a few scuffs in the dust and some drifting pigeon feathers. It's like they were following a ghost. Reaper steps out on the roof and gives it a cursory check, but there's only so far he can look without risking being seen from another roof. Faithbreaker waits for him at the door.

When he looks at him, he feels disoriented. There should be - armor. Bulk from his shoulders to just below the edge of his lungs. His hand thumps flat on Faithbreaker's chest. Faithbreaker barely responds. His eyes are alert, his head tracks Reaper's motions, but the man has retreated to what was in the needle. Reaper has seen him like this before.  "You hurting?"

"No."

They wear Talon like coats, like a shadow trailing from the backs of their heads to their feet. Reaper keeps walking. Faithbreaker falls in behind.

They see the delivery truck making its way down the street. Reaper does not stop, but slows. He can see extra rivets down the sides, dents on the inside in regular bands, as if the shell were bonded to another layer. Whatever this is, it's not like Talon gave him the equipment to scan inside. But if it's shielded, that's even more interesting.

**

"I am surprised that Overwatch would not offer their assistance earlier," Mondatta says. His voice is lower than a usual Omnic's speaking tone, but it seems to echo in the small, ancient room.  

"We received an anonymous tip that concerned us," Winston answers. 

"It's a different world," Reinhardt says, frowning seriously. "I know the Shambali have not left their mountains often. How many are there who want to keep things like they were? Tense? Isolated?" They all glance at Zenyatta, waiting for his input. Winston was hoping he'd speak up in their favor sooner, but he seems content to listen.

Mondatta pauses. "I am confused as to how official this visit is, on your part."

"Semi," says Winston, while Reinhardt says, "not." They know that the five Shambali in the room all noted their lack of coordination. "Let me," says Winston. "Reinhardt is here by my invitation. I'm the one who received a tip. I'm the one who chose to act on it. I'm the one who asked a friend of a friend to bring me to this meeting. I got the tip as an agent of Overwatch. I chose to act on it myself."

"And I am here only to help my friend, and protect whoever needs it." Reinhardt's fierce stare takes them all in as he rests one hand comfortably on the handle of his hammer. "I have never needed official permission before I do that."

Mondatta glances at Zenyatta again. "I would never refuse the concern of a friend," says Zenyatta. "But-"

"I know." Mondatta's interruption is gentle. "You don't wish the Shambali to be drawn along your path because we were surprised." He turns to the Overwatch agents. "Your request to be near us is reasonable. But I do have concern that the presence of weapons will put minds on impatience and action, not meditation and renewal."

"I can leave the cannon out of sight unless it's needed," Winston says.

"With the hammer," Reinhardt agrees. 

"That was much simpler than expected," Mondatta says. "Very well. Please try to make yourselves as unobtrusive as possible, but I will not turn away anyone who only wishes to stand with us." Reinhardt and Winston bump knuckles. Reinhardt leans over to Zenyatta, who meets the gesture with soft precision. Mondatta keeps his hands folded, so Reinhardt rests his hand on his hammer again.

"Thank you. I hope we're not needed to do anything. I think I'd like to stay out of sight, since we were so careful on the way in," Winston says. "Can we talk for a while?"

"I was just about to ask you to join us in meditation," Zenyatta answers. The Omnics make room for them without fuss or further discussion. Reinhardt and Winston move to join them.

**

She's in position, on a balcony, with netting draped over her so that scanners will not easily find her. She's identified where the Talon team is. She's right on top of them. When they move, she's ready to protect her friends.

It's a pity she won't be able to concentrate on what Mondatta has to say. She could use some uplifting.  She waits as the minutes slide into hours.

**

"Talon's enemies are my enemies," he murmurs into the darkening air. Sunset's last glow is fading. Nobody is there to hear him but himself. "Talon's enemies are my enemies." He feels itchy and irritable. He thinks he used to smoke when he felt like this, once. "Talon's enemies are my enemies." 

The words feel strange in his mouth. They feel like... they feel like light, hollow threads, things that were accepted, like _Reaper_ has him swinging around to see who called him. Things that drag and pull him. Things that... things that he...

Things that he did not form for himself.

 _Like Faithbreaker's name?_ he wonders. He is about to enter a fight against the enemies of Talon. There will be a man fighting at his side. There will be cooperation. There will be unity. The enemies of Talon will be eliminated.

"Talon's enemies..."

He has an idea he has chanted it, he has an idea, from the expectation of relief that brought it to mind when he felt that itch, that he said it when he needed them to stop.

It feels... he sees, in his mind's eye, his fingers reach for something when he needs to reload, and close around a hollow shell. He is very careful not to put this into words.

But there is something else he can try, as the shouts and murmurs of the restive crowd work through the boards between him and them. "Commander Gabriel Reyes."

It feels like a chambered round clicking into place.

(He still itches.)

**

This is not what he expected. He should have; he should have realized that Winston and Reinhardt - but they have never gone alone. Whatever trouble they expect, they believe they are ready. They are close by the Shambali, and do not see what he can.

He doesn't know which to focus on: the shape working on the roof, or the one lying on the balcony.

The shape working on the roof seems to be sparing lives, although its ultimate intent is questionable. The one below has a sniper rifle angled towards the end of the square. He cannot make out anything on its blank face, blue and featureless, like a mockery of an Omnic's head.

The decision is made.

**

Zipties. Batteries popped out of radios and earpieces confiscated. Dull blows to his forearms and shins, struggles, attempts to cry out. Routine. The security is good but not attentive enough; they imagine the danger is on its way, not beside them.

Faithbreaker lowers the last one to the rooftop, carefully away from the slope, and flicks his visor to scan for anyone else. There are no more standing on the roof. There is something on one of the rooftops, at a distance past the spiked gates. Something small, silvery and bent down low. An Omnic? It has not seen him. It is looking fixedly halfway down another building. Faithbreaker tenses. That's where his handler and the Talon extraction team are waiting to see if he and Reaper meet interference.

However, he has his orders. If he moves now, he thinks they'll be done and ready to leave by the time the distant shape has chosen to do anything.

Faithbreaker starts running down the stairs. He's not worried about waking anyone in the building; his visor has a gas mask. The building still has a faint, reddish haze hanging in the air. He has a few shock grenades, carefully calibrated. With them, he can stun humans and devastate electronics.

The only complication is that he can only kill those designated as the enemies of Talon. Otherwise, he's free to do whatever he needs. 

**

Pieces tap and click on the board. Plans start to splinter and fray at the edges. A slow tip turns to a slide.

**

Mondatta emerges through the doorway. The crowd roars. He lifts his hands. For a moment he stops, as if overwhelmed by the power, the positivity, of the crowd. Ana can't see him for a moment through the signs and the lifted hands. The mood is jubilant. But she knows Reaper is very close by. Winston is alert, and Reinhardt's presence fills her with relief. Ana scans the roofs and windows around her, looking for anything out of place. She feels watched.

Finally, she looks behind her, into the empty room. Of course, there is no one there. Talon is a floor below, and cannot get to the room behind her in the derelict building. She lowers her head to her scope, checking the windows across the way again. The roofline. Nothing seems out of place at all in the night, but her instincts are screaming.

Faithbreaker is their sniper. She thinks about Jesse. Thinks about what he'd be doing. Draws a blank; even if Talon taught him patience more effectively than Gabriel ever has, she should have detected him by now. She is far better at this game.

She reaches for her binoculars. She left them. She is too used to her bionic eye. Swearing softly, she turns her scope down towards Reinhardt and Winston, wanting a better look at the spaces beside them.

Ana has worked without a spotter for years thanks to her eye. She does not over-focus on her gun. She hears a whisper-soft hiss above and behind her. If that noise were caused by someone, they are clinging to the roof above her.

She rolls.

The sword cuts deep into the balcony. A flaring, green visor comes up to look into her helmet. Genji stands with a furious whir, dragging the sword out. Ana can hear Talon soldiers panicking and moving below him.

"I nearly doubted," he says, velvet-smooth, " _Talon_ ," and lunges.

She cannot explain to a sword. Ana throws her netting at him, swinging her rifle wildly to knock the sword off-course, and leaps off the balcony. 

**

Reaper turns his head just in time to see... his mask's optics give him what they can. A green blur is fighting some kind of amoeba while someone falls out a window? It's happening where their handler and the team is; he has his orders; it is their problem.

He moves, kicking the door open. The crowd parts. Someone throws a sign at him, raised Omnic and human palms together. He bats it aside. Faithbreaker comes out in harmony with him, dropping down from an archway. The crowd ripples back. The monkey smashes through a window and pulls out a huge, metal hammer, passing it to a man in armor. The Omnic monks are backing towards the door. Human security is moving to meet him. Reaper lunges.

The night is nothing but movement. Humans are shrieking. Omnics in the crowd are reacting, calling out, waving signs. Someone fires a pistol, once-twice, at Faithbreaker. There is the snap of bone and a scream. Panic starts to spread like flame in dry grass. Reaper has orders not to kill. He incapacitates, ruthless and joyless. There is no challenge here. They were not prepared for him. They never could be.

The targets are there. He identifies the priority one, and swings a shotgun up.

There is a thrumming noise he can feel in his bones, and blue light flares in his face. His mask's night vision flickers off to compensate. He looks through the energy shield into the man's eyes. He is older than Reaper, gray shooting into his hair, face set and eyes hard. He is protecting Reaper's targets. Reaper pulls a shotgun off his back. The man tries to say something, but the roar of the crowd is drowned out by the boom of the gun.  The shield eats the energy. Reaper glances to the side. Faithbreaker is holding off the beast using the shockwire as a whip; he is not losing, but he is not winning. Precious seconds are sliding by. The targets are moving.

Reaper dives. Rolls. Faithbreaker matches it, coming up in front of the man and flinging a shock grenade over the top of the shield. Reaper ducks an angry swing of a gorilla's arm. He brings the shotgun in line with fur.

 _Talon's enemies are my-_  

The shotgun dips, firing into the plate over the monkey's lower leg. It howls and swings again, limping.

**

Ana only had time to snatch at the balcony before her weight ripped her down. She broke her fall with her feet, but the balcony was built high off the ground and she is stunned. Men come running out, in a tight wedge, protecting each other. Ana snags her rifle's muzzle with two fingertips, pulls it under her coat, and puts her leg over the stock. They will find it the moment they check. She is betting they do not have time.

They do not. They look up as a silver shadow curls under the balcony, snake-quick, motions liquid with rage. Genji is on them like foam on the sea. They surge and threaten, covering each other, guns coming up. The crowd's screaming hides the shear of his blades through armor. Gunfire stitches the ground, ricochets off his blades and back into Talon's forces. Ana doesn't know if any of Talon is looking past him, but she crawls away. And then the first running feet of the crowd reach her, and she gets up.

The crowd might not have panicked. They were a lot of peace-loving people out to hear a monk. They witnessed armored attackers fighting a seven-foot armored giant and a gorilla. The ones at the back were running because the ones in front were screaming. They run across an angry green-glowing cyborg raging through a group of armored soldiers.

A blue-white flash lights up the square at the end of the street. Ana gasps in horror.

**

Priority down. Tertiary down. The Omnics that were further from the shock grenade are still moving, but they have accomplished what they need to. One has fallen with its head and torso behind the monkey, but he shoots into its legs. After the disturbance at the handler's location, he doesn't know if anyone is alive to call for the helicopter. He does it.

The armored man's shield stutters out. He shakes his arm and bangs the generator twice with a fist. There is a rising _bwrrrr_. It is rebooting. Faithbreaker moves, pistol coming up, firing once. Twice. The man's armor scars and dents. He sweeps his hammer across, forcing Faithbreaker to dodge and roll.

Reaper flies past him, not because of planning, but because the damned monkey landed a smashing hit. He limps to his feet.

Faithbreaker decides that's enough. There are sirens getting closer.

Faithbreaker's backing away when the man's armor suddenly glows like he's strapped to a cannon, and he flies forward. Glass shatters in the windows of nearby buildings. Reaper is hit, carried away.  Faithbreaker flings his last shock grenade. It's a bad throw, but the gorilla moves to be sure the Omnic is shielded by his huge body. The blue-white flash blinds it. Faithbreaker runs, grabs its arm, and swings over its huge body. He doesn't stop to shoot it. It's not the target at all.

The Omnic is hurt, light with its legs missing.  It's no trouble to pull it with him towards their evac point. The gorilla looks up, shaking its head to clear it. It looks from Faithbreaker to his captive and holds out a hand.

"Let him go!" Faithbreaker roars. The giant, armored shape has Reaper in a bear hug, having just torn away his second shotgun. "Let him _go_."

The Omnic's head rolls back. Faithbreaker hopes it's not dying, it's useless as a hostage. But it lifts a hand up. The giant lets Reaper fall. Reaper staggers to his feet. He stumbles towards Faithbreaker.

"Jesse," the Omnic says. "Jesse. May you seek peace."

Faithbreaker watches Reaper move. He guesses: broken ribs, possible cracks to hip, shoulder? Collarbone? Possibly his skeleton is mazed like old paint on a dresser.

"Put him down, Jesse! That's Zenyatta! You're killing him!" the gorilla shouts. "You have to stop the fluid leaking out." It moves an inch towards them. Faithbreaker lowers the Omnic flat, pistol pressed against its face, and looks back to Reaper. He's still walking. Faithbreaker hurts to see him hurting like that. He drags the Omnic through the doorway. 

"Jesse," says the Omnic.

Faithbreaker looks up through the square of the rising stairs, all the way up to the roof. Glances to the right, to the equipment cache he left. There's a grapple there. He can get them up to evac. Reaper's boot lands on the doorway, and he catches the doorframe. Sirens and lights are filling the square.

"Jesse," says the Omnic.

Faithbreaker reaches out, catches Reaper, and swings the pistol down at the Omnic's face. Reaper's hand comes down over his. Faithbreaker snarls. Interference. Disunity. Reaper wrenches the pistol away, strength versus strenght. It falls from his gloved hand.

Faithbreaker whips the grapnel up and fires. Tests the catch of it with their weight.  

"Jesse," says the Omnic.

Faithbreaker anchors the grapnel to Reaper's armor and carries them away towards the roof.

 **

Ana can't get a shot. Faithbreaker (Jesse) is standing in the door, she can see his shadow, and Gabriel is staggering, steady and lonely, dark and tall, towards him. There's a helicopter on the roof. She has to meet with Winston. She starts up the stairs, prepared to wait out the first sirens and slip away.

Something bites into her calf, and she cries out as she falls. Genji is there, at the foot of the stairs, small and bright and green-dappled, brilliant with rage. Blade raised. Her rifle will never come around in time, and even after the blade has dulled on Talon armor, she doesn't think that she can block with the weapon. Her tranqs won't get through his armor.

Ana does the only thing she can.


	11. Riposte

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Objects in motion stay in motion, unless acted on by an unbalanced force.

When they come up on the roof, Faithbreaker pulls them over sideways, letting them hang on the rope. He lays the edge of his gun hand on the roof, thumb towards his ribs, bone against the ridge of his armor. Then he drops both their weight on it. Reaper doesn't see what he's doing in time. He can't stop him. The little noise of pain Faithbreaker makes goes right through him. He struggles to get up. Faithbreaker coolly takes the grapnel with his good hand. They limp onto the ramp of the helicopter.

They can't talk freely. Faithbreaker is ignoring him, in any case, closing his helmet and slumping in a long, elegant sprawl against the helicopter wall. Reaper lowers himself down. Everything hurts. He's lucky the charge had been into the empty air of the courtyard; Reaper could only imagine what would have happened if the hammer of the man's body had smashed him against the anvil of a stone wall.

Reaper can see Faithbreaker's hand is hurting him. He gets it. King's Row had a reputation for being safe. There probably wasn't a camera in that lobby.

If there is, Talon might be able to recover some angle of Faithbreaker dropping the pistol. He now has a reason he did. It's simple, it's elegant, and it's something Faithbreaker is paying for Reaper's move.

He wants to tell him. _Jesse._ It's a good name, sharp, a snap of tongue from upper palate to lower teeth, sound lifting at the end like the name's half joy. Reaper knows this is all coming from adrenaline, but it's there anyway, he wants to speak it.

Faithbreaker adjusts his gaze a half-inch further from Reaper's position. Reaper wonders about last names. But he's recovered enough. He gets up. From Faithbreaker's stillness, he knows he's not forgiven for interrupting his kill. Reaper settles down beside him, snapping open a biotic field in wordless apology. Faithbreaker flexes his hand in the armored glove. Then, he gets up and moves.

Reaper understands. It's not that Faithbreaker is feeling masochistic, it's that his excuse has to hold, or Reaper's back in the lab for the foreseeable future. He shuts off the field. Faithbreaker gives him a narrow, furious look, crosses over, puts it on again, shoves it against his chest, and goes to talk to the pilot.

 _Zenyatta._ It gives him an odd, jangly feeling. Not very familiar, but something he knew about, once. Better than _Shambali._ The pain in his ribs starts to ease, and he breathes more deeply.

**

"Tracer," Genji says, "I'm sorry to wake you."

"No problem!" Tracer yawns. "I was awake, actually. I can't sleep, so I was about to check on the news at home. What can I help with?"

"I was wondering," Genji says. "Were there any former Blackwatch-" His datapad shakes. Jack is calling. "-with the Talon group we attacked?"

"Not a one!" she answers. "All our friends stayed friendly! Nice to have that these - Holy-! Genji! What happened! Are you all right?"

"Jack is calling. Thank you, Tracer. Goodbye." He retreats.

"Genji," Jack says. "I'm - I'm sorry. Look, what's going on? We'd have helped, if you'd asked for more of us."

"I didn't ask for anyone. I just wanted to see the Shambali. Thank you for your condolences. There is no one who is just like Mondatta."

"Can you tell Winston or Reinhardt to report in?" Jack's tone is darker, words crisper. "There is a panicked crowd on the news."

"I... if I see them," Genji says. He cannot speak for a moment. "I am not coming back. Not now. It would not be - not now."

"Take the time you want. Later," Jack's voice takes on an ominous edge, "we'll talk about this. Not now. I understand, Genji."

**

"They just left," Jack is raging. "Can you believe it? They just - left, and Winston doesn't want to tell me why!" Mercy is watching a shaky feed of Reinhardt smashing into Reaper. The smaller body is carried towards the camera as if it's been hit by a train. It jerks like a ragdoll when Reinhardt stops, trapped by a metal-covered arm. "Mercy?"

"I didn't know," Mercy says, looking away from the feed. "I never would have-"

"I wouldn't have let them go alone, either! They didn't tell me then!" He exhales deeply. "Sorry. I should let you get back to... why aren't you sleeping? It's early."

"I couldn't sleep."

Jack nods. "Go try. I'll do what I can about this." Mercy glances over to see that he has a string of waiting calls.  She leaves the room as he turns to them.

**

Mondatta's destruction is a link in the chain. Not... personal, as if it were really possible to be personal with an Omnic. But necessary. Overwatch is weakened enough by the loss of Blackwatch to allow more. It should be easy.

But somehow, she has managed to set her friends against her friends, time and again. When she closes her eyes, she can see the impact. Jesse would have died from that.

Ana has been missing for days and days. No hospital has reported anyone coming in matching her description. Mercy has searched. Jack has not looked any less worn, any less confused, any less as if he is going to cry when he sees her empty desk. Little Fareeha is not eating or sleeping well.

There is too much more to do to allow this to continue. Another hit, and Overwatch should disband.

Mercy doesn't want to do it. Jack is... Jack is not needed like Gabriel was. But is she to risk him dying? Is she willing to pour the blood of more good people over her hands, for her cause? Who knows? Maybe she can move him back into place.

When he is done with his calls, she tells him what she told Genji, about the stolen research. It shakes his faith in her that she did not report it before, but he has taken too many shocks for it to rattle him like it would have. And:

"I was thinking of a use for it that I didn't want to mention," Angela says.

"This is the time, Angie." Jack's hands are fists. "Tell me."

"I didn't want to give you false hope. I was thinking that whatever Talon did... it might be undone if I were to use this new advancement." Mercy tightens one hand into a fist and clenches the other over it. "I don't want either of them to die, because there is a strong chance it won't work at all. But the possibility... The possibility makes it worthwhile research to pursue."  

Theoretically, it's true, and (she thinks) if it were to happen, if their brains were to be remade as before the... change... they would lose their memories of their time with Talon, as thoroughly as Talon had removed their previous lives. Probably. Mercy feels that she has reconciled one more lie.

Things are back under control.

**

Faithbreaker has reported for them. Reaper waits, but no one comes to collect him. Faithbreaker has... omitted. As Reaper knew he would the moment Faithbreaker injured his own hand. They are sent on a small mission. It is, essentially, a milk run, but they are sent together. He welcomes it.

They wait quietly for transport on a broken-down memorial far from town. The night is quiet. The air is cold and dry; weeds rattle in the darkness.

"How's the hand?"

"Better," Faithbreaker says, sounding bored. "They were not impressed. They said I should have held a gun despite our injuries." He pauses. "You are lucky they'd given me that shot. It fucks up the scans by whatever it does to my brain, and they can't get a read on me."

Reaper walks up to him. It's too dark to see his face, but Faithbreaker sighs through his nose and leans against the smooth wall of the memorial. Now that they have stopped moving, the cold is settling into them. Reaper pulls off his coat and drapes it around Faithbreaker's shoulders. The man stays resolute for a minute. Then he relaxes.

"Why did you do it?" he asks. "It was my mission."

"Did you hear what they were saying?"

"I wasn't listening."

"Your name's Jesse." Faithbreaker kisses him absently. Reaper breaks it. "Jesse."

"Don't m-" Faithbreaker rolls his weight more firmly against him. "Doesn't mean anything to me. Are you cold?"

Reaper strokes the back of his neck. "No." He tips his head as Faithbreaker reaches for his belt. "Here?"

"Maybe not." Faithbreaker sinks down on his haunches. "Maybe."

"You'll wreck your knees."

"Make them give me kneepads." Faithbreaker's fingers are quick with his armor, even in the dark.

"Wait."

Faithbreaker makes an annoyed noise. "What for?"

Reaper sinks down to crouch facing him. Faithbreaker grumbles. "We _knew_ them. Or they knew us. The one in the armor? He could have thrown me down and crushed me with that damned hammer. He didn't try. He caught me. Someone wants to-"

"Take us from Talon." Faithbreaker's voice rises. "Will they give us missions? Will they separate us? Will they try to recycle us? What if they have their own plans for us?"

"I want to know what they _want._ I can't speak to them-"

"What they wanted was to interfere with us. You interfered with me. I have given up so much-" Faithbreaker's hands are warm on his. His tone is pleading. "So much for you. I have waited, I have watched, I have done whatever I could, whenever you needed it. I am trying to do everythin' I can for you." Reaper hears him swallow. "Even keep my mouth shut when I know I should be talking. And I'm always watching you move away."

"Someone called you Jesse," Reaper says to the shadow in his coat. "Don't you want to know who? For how long? Where you came from?"

"No," Faithbreaker says in a low grate. "I don't want to play pretend anymore."

Reaper reaches out, pulling him close. Faithbreaker comes easily, as he knew he would, settling into his arms as if his armor was all Faithbreaker wanted to feel.

By the time the helicopter comes, Reaper has restored his armor. Faithbreaker passes him his coat back as they walk up the ramp. They sit side by side, waiting for Talon to tell them what is next.

 _What is next_ is training and practice time. Then, a simple meeting with Torchbearer and some friends. Reaper glances over the assignment. He does not have the luxury to stare at the picture on the page. But it hangs in his head as he sits in the wide hallway outside, waiting for Faithbreaker to finish getting comfortable with the tools for the mission.

_Jack._

An image back-to-back behind an image of him. Possibilities. Hints. Were they facing away because they were fighting? He is kept within Talon's bubble, prevented from any aspect of the outside world, with Faithbreaker on missions... and Faithbreaker has been patient, has protected his curiosity, to the point where any consequences will fall hard on them both. He has not been able to investigate his name. He has seen glimpses of it; a highway named after him, a fund for veterans, nothing useful. The world assumes anyone with an interest in Commander Gabriel Reyes already knows who he is.

It is maddening.

So the question is:

Is he so miserable that he will interfere with Faithbreaker's mission, for a first name and a face, for someone he does not honestly remember?

Why is he even trying to find a space for himself within what Talon has made of him?

_Because they believe Faithbreaker is disposable. I disagree. I may disagree about more things. I_

He has an idea that he is learning more about himself with this stretch of thought than he has in the last few weeks of trying to clear a space in his murky memory.

_want to know what._

Faithbreaker prowls through the door. Reaches out a hand to pull him up. Reaper takes it, and moves with him down the hallway.

**

The hospital seems fine to Jack.

Winston has not been fine. He and Reinhardt have seemed unusual, jumpy and watchful, suspicious of everything, since they got back. It's been driving Jack compeletely crazy. They're down in the loading bay now, helping to search for the technical bandits that have been stealing precious biotics and driving Mercy crazy with its requests for help.  Jack tried to tell them that it was just a scouting mission, and they didn't need everyone in Overwatch coming along. They hadn't listened.

He doesn't see anything. The hospital is on the edge of a zone of strained hostilities, and it gets shipments of aid that clutter the place with stacks of empty crates and packing containers. It's a goddamn maze. He cuts back the way he came.

 **

He knows he was supposed to work with Torchbearer. She's maneuvered everyone into position this far, and she'll be there after the capture. But Faithbreaker remembers what happened last time. He's afraid for her, with this one.

The monk - gorilla, Reaper might not care about the details like that, but Faithbreaker does - is down with the armored man that hurt Reaper so badly. It's more firepower than he was expecting. Torchbearer is brave. Reaper will be able to hold them off. But if something goes wrong, Faithbreaker wants her out of this. Faithbreaker breaks off pursuit of the target, who is moving fast, and looks for her instead.

He loses the target in the maze of crates as Torchbearer comes out of the side exit. Her armor is completely wrong; instead of her defiant set, she's wearing something that makes her look... obedient? Passive? Faithbreaker snorts.

But he can escort her out. He breathes out softly, relieved, and drops down to stand by her. She skips back with two surprised steps.

**

Fuck, he's lost. Jack takes a shortcut, scaling a wall and dropping over it. He sees the figure advancing by Mercy. _Faithbreaker._ And that's his healer. _Jesse,_ he thinks, _I am so sorry_ but they're too far away.

If they lose Mercy, they could lose everyone. He doesn't have anything else, his only weapon is his pulse rifle. Jesse's head, his gut are armored. If Jack fucks around trying to stop him, Faithbreaker is likely to kill Mercy just to take someone with him.

It's a hard decision, but Jack is in command because he can make the hard decisions in a short time. He can follow through.

Four shots take Faithbreaker in the heart.

Jack's already running as Mercy screams. She drops her staff to reach out, then catches it before it hits the ground. Jesse crumples at her feet. Mercy's scream does not slow. She cups the side of his face. A pulse rifle  is meant to devastate. There is nothing more her staff can do.

Jack skids to a stop beside them as Mercy raises her staff and corrects his misapprehension. The staff glows. The energy spills over her skin, down her arm, lighting up her whole body. He thinks if she kicked against the ground, it would lift her off her toes. The glow echoes through Jesse's crumpled corpse. He jerks, spasmodically. The wound over his back closes. He arches back, head clunking against the wall, gulping air deep. Just when Jack thinks he's seeing agonal breaths, from a brain stem somehow forced to throw a few more switches before its lights are off for good-

-Jesse's eyes open, and his hands come under him, and he pushes himself to his feet. He stands very quietly, gaze low, panting for air. Jack realizes he can hear shotguns in the distance, but he has no time for that. 

"Jesse?" Jack asks. Brown eyes come up, staring into his. Jack comes up slowly. He reaches out. Jesse's quick enough that even Jack would have to work to deflect the pistol if Jesse went for it, but Jesse doesn't move, still breathing shallowly. His hands are shaking. Jack tosses the gun to the side. There's a slow, fluttering blink, and a hesitant, sideways look at Mercy. Jesse looks at Jack. He blinks. Jack sees recognition in his eyes. He's silent.

"I think it's over," Mercy says. "I think... I think he's back." She reaches out, brushing his hair back. Jesse doesn't move at first. Then, he tips his head. His hair is disheveled from the burn and flare of the energy that hit him. He looks reassuringly near-scruffy. Jack hopes that Mercy reversed everything. He hopes, he hopes that's Jesse. But he reaches to his communicator. "Winston, Reinhardt - report!"

He hears shotgun blasts.  "Busy!" Winston yells into the communicator. Jack swears, looking back at Mercy, waiting for her to verify.

"What year is it?"

"I don't..." he frowns. "I don't know."

"Who is that?"

"Jack Morrison," he answers promptly. Jack beams. He gets a tiny smile in return. It's the most... _Jesse_ he's seen since he saw Faithbreaker move across a distant roof. Mercy reaches up, clapping a hand on his shoulder, and Jack turns to her. God, he thought he'd killed Jesse. He didn't, he's not going to have to, he could hug her.

"Cowboy," she says, holding Jack's enthusiasm back with a raised hand, "what time is it?"

Weight hits with an arm locking around Jack's throat, and something jabs him in the side. He reaches up to tear Faithbreaker's arm away, but with the pain comes a fierce burning. Pins and needles run down his arms and legs, and he gasps against the elbow tightening around his neck.

There is a sound like _WHP_. The elbow relaxes. He pulls. Faithbreaker's face comes into sight, slackening and innocent. Jack falls to his knees, but he still has enough will and strength to stop them from smashing into the pavement. As Jack watches, Faithbreaker's eyes roll back, his lashes flutter shut, and he slumps bonelessly. He's warm, heavy, and harmless. There's a bright metal shaft standing out from his shoulder.

A figure steps off the platform above and lands by Jack.

"It's naptime," says Ana Amari.


	12. Cover Break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything changes, except the things that stay the same.

Ana does not miss the brightening of Mercy's eyes on seeing her. That spark of joy is gone just as fast; Ana's survival is a problem. There is no way out of this one. Jack is semi-kneeling, weakly struggling out from under a snoozing Talon agent in a venemously green catsuit. Ana stands quietly, facing Mercy, half her face still wrapped in white bandages.  

The distinctive noise of Tracer appearing fills the little alleyway between boxes. "Hey! Uh - what's going on?" Tracer blinks forward, a pistol in each hand. "Ana! Wait-" Her arm swings up, elbow bent, but clearly ready to swing her pistol down at Ana. "Ana?"

"Tracer, watch Mercy," Jack slurs commandingly.

"I'm not mind controlled," Ana says. "It was never drugs. Genji and I figured out that Mercy is the Talon agent."

Tracer stares, wide-eyed, although she moves her arm a little. Mercy has not moved a muscle. The wind picks up, vibrating the rays of her wings. "Mercy is _what?_ What Talon agent?"

Ana realizes that their fleet is scattered on deep waters. "Never mind. There might not be much time. Help me restrain Jesse and get Jack inside. He's weakened."

"No," Jack grates. "You have to stop the fighting before Winston or Reinhardt get hurt. That's not how Gabriel shoots when he's serious, but the blasts are getting closer together. He's going to stop fucking around when his friends don't check in."

Ana jerks her head towards Jesse's dropped pistol. "Take that. Show it to him if you must. Tell him we've captured Faithbreaker and Torchbearer." Mercy blinks once.

"Torchbearer?"

Ana shoots Mercy with a sleep dart. "Torchbearer."

Tracer shoves her pistols into their holsters, blinks forward, snatches up the gun, and is out of sight with two blue flares. Ana is left with two unconscious Talon agents, one formidably trained and bigger and stronger than she is.

"How are you doing, Jack?" She has restraints ready, and gets them on Jesse's wrists and ankles. She locks them together, even though it's going to make him harder to drag.

"It's snowing."

"Sorry."

"Snowing. Purple spiders. Where's Genji?"

"He dropped me off. He said he was afraid he would kill Angela for making his friends kill Mondatta." She looks over Jesse again for any hidden weapons. Thankfully, it's a simple search. Ana calls Genji. "Have the plane fly towards my signal."

Jack rests his head on the ground. "How did he know?"

"He's been concerned about her. He broke into her infirmary while she was talking to you and saw that one of the Talon soldiers flagged as former Blackwatch. When he called Tracer," it is difficult not to kick Mercy in the ribs. Ana binds her wrists, "and she said that there were none, we knew she was covering up for Talon. Remember the autopsy, where Mercy said no one was shot?"

"Ana, I fucked up."

"So did I. So did Gabriel." Ana snorted. "If she hadn't started collecting us off the shelf, we might never have realized. But she reached too high." She starts dragging Mercy towards one of the crates. "Do you think you can move? I can get a wheelchair."

"Ugh. Better do that."  

Ana looks down at Mercy, who she'll have to have out of sight when Genji arrives. She draws back her foot. She takes a long breath in through her nose, a hard breath out through her mouth. She thinks about seeing Fareeha. Thinks about who she wants Fareeha to grow up to be. She puts her foot down again. Then, she goes. She is wasting time.

**

All he's doing is buying time.

Faithbreaker has been secretive about his own side of the job. It surprises Reaper, who's used to Faithbreaker answering every thought he has. Torchbearer is in on this one. He's seen Torchbearer in intense light, or from a distance. He's not sure about much when it comes to her.

It doesn't really matter. All Reaper is doing is stopping the armored man and the gorilla from realizing that Faithbreaker is busy with their friend. ( _Jack_ he thinks, and is curious. He doubts they'll let him visit, but he wants to know.) Reaper expects them to have a blind spot ( _like Talon_ he thinks, and quashes.) To see the armor and shotguns, recognise the inhuman speed and strength, and focus on him. Faithbreaker is capable, smart, tough. Underestimated, he's devastating.

Reaper makes them work for it, saving his ammunition, but constantly threatening to slip around that shield, or at the right angle for a good shot on the monkey's head. To his surprise, neither one of them seems aggressive. They try to wear him down, steady and resolute. They don't talk to each other, using their eyes and small hand gestures to coordinate. Reaper keeps a mental tally of how much ammunition he's got left as he maneuvers, dodges, circles and reloads. Cracks web the monkey's armor. The shield goes down and recharges time and again.

Reaper begins to test his speed against the beast's. It's smart. It keeps trying to lure him onto bad footing or where it can outmanuever him with swift climbing. He tracks the armored man in his head, expecting that damned charge. He's very careful not to be caught in one place as they move.

The fight is fast-paced. They cut across a ridge of concrete with shipping crates on either side. He's through about half his ammunition when the monkey yells something in a distracted tone, scrambling too far over a rusty patch. The crate breaks beneath the monkey's foot, throwing him half-down. The weak metal shrieks and buckles under the sudden change of weight, trapping him in one spot. Reaper was going to try to bait a charge, to force the man to expend some of that armor's power. This is too perfect to pass up. He turns and crouches for a leap towards the monkey as it struggles to bend the metal away.

The giant man roars, whipping his hammer up and crashing it onto the pavement between them with a thunderous "Hammer DOWN!"

The shockwave throws Reaper to his knees.

_The sky is choked with smoke. Omnics cluster and pack on the muddy hillsides, Bastion fire chewing through the barriers at their flanks. Gabriel is down, trying to get a headless body off his legs and a shattered turret off his chest. His gloves are too slick with oil and blood; the damned thing feebly rotates. He can hear Bastion cannons start to whir-_

_"Hammer DOWN!" Reinhardt roars, and saves his life with earthshaking force, stunning them all just long enough for him to heave himself to his feet. He staggers behind a pile of their shattered friends as he reloads. When he leaps out, Reinhardt's barrier is between-_

He comes back to himself panting, staring. One shotgun is lying a foot away from him. The other's muzzle is pressed into the ground. He is still kneeling. The monkey is free, curiously standing on its hind feet, watching him with its head cocked. Reinhardt is standing. He could have fired his armor and crushed Reaper in that moment, in the breath before. Instead, they are all still. Reinhardt. That's... who the _fuck_ is Reinhardt? He wants to speak it, he wants to ask. It's not mission vital. The words won't come. He draws breath, opens his mouth, nothing -

He punches the ground in frustration. They both move, Reinhardt bringing up his shield, the monkey wallowing back two (four?) steps and raising an arm warily to shield his head. Reaper stands.

It's been too long. Faithbreaker's been too quiet. It's mission urgent. "Report," he murmurs into his mask. There's silence. _Shit._ Something hits the ground to his right. He glances -

Goes still.

"We... we have Faithbreaker," says the woman with the blue star on her chest. "And Torchbearer. They're alive. So... what if you put the shotguns down? And come with us?" She's clearly affected, deeply, by something. Her eyes glitter, and she keeps taking and holding deep breaths as if she's trying not to start sobbing. "We don't want to hurt you, Commander. We want to help."

He looks at Reinhardt. The armored man holds out a hand, palm up, although the other still holds the hammer braced. No more memories are breaking free - not that he wants another fucking flashback, but anything helpful would be nice. He looks at Winston. Absofucking _lutely_ nothing. He looks at her. He just knows that face from the mission. Nowhere else. He looks at the pistol.

Faithbreaker can't be left alone.

He's on a mission. He can't speak right now, can't ask, can't negotiate -

 _And why is that?_ Something in him, recently freed enough to wonder, asks.

Faithbreaker can't be left alone. Be left again, wondering why he wasn't important enough to be shielded, to be saved. Reaper will have to wait for extraction alone, ride back to... to what? Will they let him retrieve an asset they won't even bother to armor?  The idea of Faithbreaker waiting for rescue, while Talon shuttles him off to kick in heads on the other side of the world, seals it. Both shotguns hit the ground.

It takes several long seconds for one of them to even approach.

**

"That was... that feels too easy," Lena says to Genji. "It wouldn't have been without you guys, but suddenly we have everything."

"I know," Genji says. He doesn't look up from flinging a variety of electronic devices into a carrying case. Reaper is awake, sitting quietly in a makeshift holding cell on Winston's plane. Faithbreaker is still asleep. He is snoring gently, so Jesse it hurts. Mercy is still asleep, small and golden; Winston carried her back on his plane and had her inside before Genji got out of the one he'd borrowed. (Overwatch association was amazing for this.) Jack is swearing at invisible snowflake spiders and complaining about toothbrushes rubbing his ears.

Reinhardt and Winston have been filled in. It's her least favorite thing, telling, hearing what Mercy did. Even as much as she knows is crushing.

"Can I come?"

"No. This is a ninja and sniper mission." He taps his chest where the chronal accelerator hums on hers. "You're a good agent. We are more suited for this one."

"Okay. I'll... go watch Reaper while they move the... while they move Jesse and Mercy in." she starts off. A light touch on her shoulder makes her realize how far her shoulders have slumped.

"Ana has a world of data on what they did," he says. "They have had everything go their way, until now. They could not have expected us to sweep the board so suddenly."

She smiles, patting his hand and stepping away. He's right. But just because they have bodies back doesn't mean they've rescued _people_ yet _._

Reaper hasn't moved. She approaches, watching him through the bars. They're hard light. He hasn't tested them. They had him take off his gloves, since Gabriel Reyes, bare-handed, is still enough to take down the average security team. She's still surprised he did it.

"Can you take off your mask?" she ventures. She was actually asking if it were possible, and she's surprised when he does, flinging it edge-first through the barriers just softly enough not to be an attack (she blinks away anyways.)

He looks... exactly like he did. She was expecting him to have seamed scars and staples around his scalp, or something, something to show what happened, but... it's Gabriel Reyes, sitting quietly in dark, ominous armor, watching her with his chin up and his head just a little on one side. Regal. Considering.

"You know me, right?" she asks. He shakes his head, a miniscule gesture. "It's Tracer! My real name's Lena! I... I didn't know you that well, not like Jack or Reinhardt or Jesse, but you said I kept going right-left-right when I blinked and it would be too easy to blow my head off. Then when I kept doing it, you kept practicing with me on the training ground until I could jump at random and still shoot..."

There's not a flicker of change in his expression. She feels her shoulders start to cave again. "We missed you, you know," she says. "Everyone just... Blackwatch," at the word, he leans forward, "was broken down, and Jack had to take on everything. When I recognised you, we couldn't think what they'd done to you to make you fight against us like that. And Jesse... I knew him better than I knew you, you know, he was always out on the base taking care of things." She sniffs. "I didn't recognise him. We looked for you, you know. We looked for you both."

She can hear the engines warming up outside. Jesse and Mercy are being taken inside. So's Jack, to the infirmary, where... she has no idea who's staffing it now. There are three assistants and another doctor on base, but Mercy's infirmary has always been her haven. What's going to happen to Mercy? She doesn't know. Mercy has to have been brainwashed too, she just has to. Nothing she's done makes sense otherwise. Mercy? Doing human experimentation? Helping take people's free will? Setting them up for Talon? Not possible.

Reyes or Reaper moves, settling back against the wall. He rolls his head. "Sorry, I didn't think. Did you want to smoke? I know you're..." He shakes his head. "Okay. I'll wait, then? Just tell me if you need anything. I mean, we're not trying to - we're not doing this because we want to - you're our friend."

He takes in a breath like he's going to say something. He lets it out with an annoyed huff of air.

"I'll wait, then," she says, and goes to sit to one side, watching and waiting patiently.

He doesn't move. After a while, he puts his feet up on the bench and flips his coat over his knees, watching the silent hold with half-closed eyes.


	13. Maze

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A purposeful glide.

When they land, when the not-prisoners, not-friends are unloaded, Ana strides off the plane. Everyone knows where she's going. Nobody thinks about stopping her. She cards her way through increasingly more protected doors until she comes to one in particular. She takes a deep breath, taps twice, and strokes the card against the lock. When she steps in, the room is dark, except for a little star plugged into the wall.

"Nnh. s'early, go away."

"Is that any way to talk to your mother?"

Fareeha shrieks, hurtling out of bed like a small, dark-haired meteor, smashing into her mother's ribs with a tearful howl. Ana wraps her arms around her and rocks back and forth. Kisses the top of her head when the crying stops, patting her bony shoulders.

"Now," Ana says, "get your bag and toothbrush. You aren't staying here. It's not safe."

**

The next morning, there's talk. Lawyers. Fuss. Angela sits quietly, not speaking, gold and white traded away for an orange jumpsuit. Ana sits across the table from her. Jack... couldn't make this one.

"Mondatta's assassination might have triggered quite the event in Russia," Ana says. "I can read you the death toll, if you like. Jack is already there. In, of course, the line of fire." She scratches the side of her face. "I'm still adjusting to shooting one-eyed. But I think I will be needed soon. On the other hand, Zenyatta has volunteered to help with therapy to Gabriel and Jesse-" she scratches again. "-once he's fully repaired. He's very lucky that Winston was right there, you know. Not many people know exactly what to do when a machine body is so badly hurt. One of the things we were able to get right, even though I didn't anticipate Jesse taking a new role in the attack. He did so well countersniping."   

Angela says nothing.

"Genji is out there, risking his life and safety to try to track down the researchers that were handling our friend's research projects." Ana folds her hands. Angela closes her eyes. "I know, I know. You're not cooperating. I know that must mean you're not about to break your string of getting us injured, disabled, or killed. But I'm hoping with the investments you've made in him, you'll consider it. After all, with you imprisoned, there's no one to repair-"

Angela opens her eyes. She starts talking. Ana listens.

**

There is an injection cuff locked onto his wrist above the elbow. Faithbreaker isn't surprised. This design is a solid, armored shell. It feels like it doesn't have needles in him, but it's shaped and glued so that he can't slide it around on his wrist. It's possible there's a tube implanted from it, and he's just too numb to feel it. The cell is small, padded, and half of it's got a transparent wall. They conceded to privacy with the shower and toilet, which is kind of funny given the cameras. He's not surprised it opens onto a laboratory, either. There are many air vents throughout the cell; he wonders whether they're for suppressive gases or if the circulation is just that bad. There is no blanket, although the cot is covered with something that warms up when he lies down on it. There is nothing loose to use. He's sure he's being monitored, at every second. Just... not what by. 

They come to talk to him, and he retreats into his training until they are gone.

He is alone. He should not be. It is Torchbearer's fault for being out of position and his for not trusting her, for trying to restructure the plan mid-mission. If he had played his part better, he would be at Reaper's side. Everything would be right.

There is nothing to do but wait.

**

There is an injection cuff locked onto his wrist above the elbow. Reaper isn't surprised. This design is heavily armed and segmented, so even if he gets it against something hard (every fucking surface in here is padded) and hits it with something else hard, it won't shatter. It feels like it doesn't have needles in him, but it's shaped and glued so that he can't slide it around on his wrist. It's possible there's a tube implanted from it, and he's just too numb to feel it. He flexes his hand, making a fist, rolling down and up. He can't feel anything. He can't be sure.

_You're our friend._ He feels crawlingly wrong away from Faithbreaker. Can imagine what this is putting him through. They're not supposed to be apart. He should never have accepted the decision to split them up. He'd argued to get Faithbreaker as much armor as he did. He could have argued more to protect him. This falls on him.

They took away Reaper's own armor. He hates that. The mask was one thing (a possible way for Talon to observe, he usually put it mistrustfully by Faithbreaker's visor) but the armor? That was trusted. Functional. His.

He looks up as the door chimes once to warn him someone is about to come in. It's the dark-haired, one-eyed woman he saw on the landing platform.

"Hello, Gabriel," she says. "Please don't move suddenly while I'm in the room. Athena is prepared to trigger the bracelet. We tested it on Jack." Her mouth makes an unhappy line. "He had to sleep it off all the way to his mission."

He coughs twice. "Why Jack?"

"You must know how much stronger and faster you are than most of us." He gives a tiny nod. "That's the result of your past in the SEP - sorry, Soldier Enhancement Program. It was a massive project involving human experimentation. Most of it ended badly. Most of the candidates and enhanced soldiers are now dead. You and Jack both survived it and went on to greater things." Her gaze drops. "Until-"

He says nothing. Loyalty wars with fact. His memory begins very suddenly. They did not tell him why. It is consistent with his having been... interrupted by them.

"Talon assessed you as more susceptible than Jack. Their choice was not luck." The comment hangs for a moment in the air. "I am Ana Amari. We knew each other before you were taken."

"You look sad." She nods. "Did you know Jesse?" Tasting the name feels like freedom. There will be no consequences for knowing it. (Unless.)

"Yes. You and he were close." She says it very simply. "He had worked with you for years."

It doesn't surprise him, but he does feel a small pang. He'd thought Talon had given him that, given him that partnership, instead of something given... back? He's not sure. Trying to think in this many new ways is exhausting. He knows he... he loses the thought. He leans back against the wall. "What are their last names?"

"Whose?"

"Everyone's."

"Morrison? McCree? Oxton? Wilhelm?" It's too much. He holds up a hand to stop her. She pauses. "Winston does not have a last name," she finally finishes. He checks her face. Joking, or trying to.  She stands. "I should go. I only wanted to stop in and see you again."

He nods. He watches her go. Something about her is familiar, he thinks, but it's like his head is full of half-formed pieces, with no easy way to put them together.

**

While they wait for Jack, they keep Reyes and McCree apart. While they wait for Ana, they let the lawyers swarm.

Faithbreaker goes the least catatonic around Winston. It's like however they programmed him to resist, they didn't think to code in gorillas. His curiosity helps. If it weren't for that, Winston probably wouldn't be able to get him to trade time with Reaper for a scan of his brain. Winston doesn't see anything in most modes of scanning. Just a brain.

Then he switches to the latest filters, and sees the nanites.

It was more than he was expecting, even after seeing the logs. Grids are drawn in place, not over the frontal lobe, as he'd expected from his limited knowledge. They cover the brain. Some of them are made of tiny forming and reforming lines, some holding steady. Winston pulls his glasses off and rub his eyes. It's one thing to hear about it. It's another to see it, to see what is cordoned off, to see the nanites swarming like disorganized ants or trembling in little cubes.

"We're going to have to get these out," he says aloud.

"No."

Winston looks at his... not-really-prisoner-but-still-prisoner. "Jesse, tiny parts of your brain are being shut off from the others," he says. "According to what the researchers said, and the notes, they'd join back up if they were allowed. Meanwhile, the nanites are all that's keeping them alive. If the nanites start failing, they might not group up in time. They might just die."

Faithbreaker looks back steadily. "It's my brain."

Winston shifts on his tire, lacing his fingers. He laces his toes, too. "Yes, but-"

"It's my brain." Lena comes in, and Jesse glances at her, glances at Winston, and goes quiet and still. Lena, who's seen this, gives him a little smile and says "hallo, Jesse" anyway. Winston jerks his head to Lena, inviting her to walk along, and keeps his body between her and the man Jesse is now as they go to see Gabriel.

(Jesse is memorizing the way, Winston knows; he'll have to move them both around again.)

"What was going on?" Lena asks, as soon as the door shuts behind the man. Athena is witnessing, but she will be the only witness unless she hears something suspect.

"He doesn't want me to take the nanites out."

Lena frowns. "That's a Talon order, isn't it?"

"Probably."

"Are you going to?"

"If I think they're starting to break down, yes. They're active. Machines wear out eventually, no matter the scale. Then the damage is irreplaceable. I can't watch that happen."

"But..." Tracer sinks, dejectedly, against the wall. "I keep thinking we should ask Mercy."

"I know," Winston says more quietly, sitting beside her. "I'm not a doctor. I'm a scientist. He is right, it's his brain. Until I know, I'm just trying to talk him into it."

**

When the door chimes, Reaper is expecting Jack. He's not sure why. He was given no hint that the mission the wom - Ana spoke of won't take a long time. Faithbreaker is wearing a simple, dark, sleeveless shirt. Simple, dark, loose pants. His hair is tied back. He's clean-shaven, which must have taken a lot of patience with a shitty safety razor like the one Reaper was given.

He looks lost.

Reaper gets up, holding a hand out, and Faithbreaker crosses the space like it's nothing, crashing against him. He says nothing. Reaper understands; a murmur would be recorded. Reaper wants to try his name, wants to ask him if he remembers anyone, wants to... a thousand things. He wraps both arms around him.

"I failed you," Faithbreaker murmurs when there's a chime at the door.

"I commanded," Reaper says, taking it off his shoulders. Faithbreaker turns away as the door opens. He doesn't look back.

**

Genji stands quietly, looking around the data towers and the readouts. Ana is one room over, looking down at the body. It's smaller than she remembers. The woman's brain is in a jar. Her colleagues must have been very curious about the damage left by resurrection, when Torchbearer didn't come back. Ana decides it's just as well. When she has to kill the same person twice in a row, she feels as if she is not good at her job. This leaves four that Mercy identified, with a few assistants and technicians.

The head of the Faithbreaker project will not be telling them anything. She is lying in front of an open cabinet, having taken something from a bottle while Genji and Ana were fighting the few security forces outside. Ana knew she would likely die rather than her family know what she'd done. Pitilessly, Ana taps a few buttons on the terminal and forwards a few of her emails to local law enforcement.

Then she steps over the body of a technician and joins Genji. "Anything?"

"It's impossible to say what's been stored somewhere else." Genji strokes the top of one of the data towers. "The man that Mer-" He stops himself. "Ziegler says was head of the Reaper project was trading messages with her." He waves a datapad. "He said that he is not coming back. That he would sleep."

Ana nods, putting a foot against a data tower full of top-secret, high-priority research and kicking it over with a satisfying crash. "Then I will keep looking. We need to go."

"I know," Genji says placidly, plucking a datapad from one of the towers. "I am going with you. Are you thinking that there was too little resistance?"

"Yes."

They both run. The helicopter swoops in and starts its bombing run as they reach the end of the forest. Ana and Genji use the blooms of fire as cover, letting their heat overwhelm the helicopter's sensors, and escape into the night.  

"Damn," says Ana, finally. "I wanted to blow it up."

"Talon slips away when threatened, and reforms somewhere else." Genji says. "I hope we interrupted their data recovery on the way in, when we cut the cables." He sounds doubtful.  

"I know. It was too much to hope that we would be able to get everything." Ana stretches. "Let's get what we have to Winston. Then, we can go become a wake-up call."

"Ana."

She turns back at Genji's tone. "Yes?"

Genji hands her a datapad. "She was discussing this with  when she heard us."

The datapad says _mine knows how to contact us, should_  As she watches, it blanks. Someone has wiped it remotely. She heaves it end over end towards the fires, just in case Talon decides to trace it.

"Hers," she says, as they start moving again. "Faithbreaker?"

Genji does not answer.

**

"Jack Morrison," says Gabriel Reyes.

"Yeah," says Jack, swallowing. Gabe looks... fuck. He looks just like the last time Jack saw him. No, wait. Something's a little off. A little rawness to the way he moves, the way he looks, as if he's had to relearn a fraction of his grace. Like he'd forgotten some control of his expressions. "Yeah."

"Commander?"

"Strike Commander. But you call me Jack."

"Ana said we were friends," Gabriel says, as if he's testing the words.

"Yeah. You and I had each other's backs since before the Crisis."

"Which we fought in."

"Which we won," Jack corrects. "A couple of the documentaries are pretty good, if you don't want the archives."

"I do."

"Okay." There's a little silence. "So... you know you got mind controlled?"

A little flinch around his eyes. A little slowness as he moves his hands together. "They told me."

"Like..."

Gabriel Reyes rests his head in his hands. "They say," he says, "Talon burned out parts of my brain, grew them back, and put in what they wanted."

"Jesus," said Jack. "Did they _try_ to make it tactful?" Gabriel nods. "Well, that's a start, fucking-"

"There isn't a way," Gabriel says, with worlds of exhaustion. Jack hunches his shoulders, trying to see Gabriel's face, and then risks a hand on his shoulder. Gabriel looks up. "What now?"

"Uh," Jack says. "I mean... I just don't want you to end up in Talon's hands again." Whatever things were like, they can't go back like that. Gabriel knows his thoughts were chosen by someone else. He'll understand. "We want you to be able to choose what to do next. As much as you can, I mean. You're going to have to trust us, and go into hiding."

"What about F-" Gabriel closes his eyes. "Jesse?"

"I knew you'd want him with you," Jack says, smiling. Gabriel's eyes narrow. "What?"

"He gets a choice too," Gabriel says, in a tone uglier than Jack was expecting.

"Don't you-" Jack shuts his mouth before he asks Gabriel if he knows Jack. "-think that's what he'd want?"

"Yes." Gabriel's face is unforgiving. "How do you know?"

Is Gabriel trying to figure out if he spoke to Jesse first? Why is that important? Why not just ask? "Right, I haven't asked-"

"I mean," Gabriel says, "is this how it always was?"

"Oh." Jack relaxes. "Yeah, you've cared about him for years. We didn't talk a whole lot about it, you weren't that open with it. You were both soldiers, you were a leader. There was always a problem to fix before it was time for... personal, you know?" Gabriel nods, slowly. Jack crushes a frown.

"What kind of mission?"

Jack hesitates. Then he decides Gabriel had better know. "Kind of averting a second Omnic Crisis. Keeping the situation in Russia stable, cutting off an Omnium, peacekeeping among the local Omnics. Shooting military Omnics, patting heads of peaceful ones." He stops himself from adding _you know the drill._  "You and Jesse kicked a hornet's nest."

 "The mission." Gabriel has his feet braced on the floor.

"Yeah."

"Gabriel?"

"Yeah?"

"Why did you stop Jesse from shooting Zenyatta?"

"Because the Omnic knew him."

Jack grins. "When Zenyatta said you did that, I knew you were doing what you could."

Gabriel shakes his head. "We both did. He kept them off me. He kept me from paying for that." He swallows. His hands relax. "If he didn't have my back, I would never have made it here."

"Okay," Jack says. "I was going to go talk to him next."

"Jack-" Gabriel swallows. "I know he's not as open to talking to everyone as I am. But Talon-" 

"I know," says Jack, since Gabriel is obviously finding this hard to talk about. "We'll be patient. We get it. You've both been through hell. And you're both here now. We're not giving up."

**

Gabriel was familiar. Jesse isn't. No beard, hair smooth, ponytail hanging, there's no trace of the scruffy kid, or Reyes' protege, or anything. He doesn't look like anyone. His eyes are emotionless. When the door opens, he glances up, unmoving from where he sits on the bed.

"Hey," Jack says. God. A padded cell? Could they seriously not do any better? Even if Jesse learned from Reyes when it came to improvised weaponry, this setting wasn't going to help. "I was hoping we could talk."

Jesse glances up, looks at his face for two seconds, and slumps. His eyes go from blank to remote. It's the same thing they've all described. Jack takes a long look.

Then, he goes and gets Gabriel.

Jesse snaps out of it when Gabriel steps in, looking between them like he's not sure what he's being asked for. Jack watches something fade away, leaving Jesse looking... hopeless?  

"Don't look like that," Gabriel says, sitting on the bed. Jesse watches him with a wariness Jack wasn't expecting. There isn't anywhere else to sit. Not even a chair bolted to the floor. God, he's going to have to come up with something better, they're both brainwashed. There has to be some way to treat them more normally, let them remember they're people.  

"What now?" Jesse asks.

"I want to remember," Gabriel says. "I want to know what I did before." He puts an arm over Jesse's shoulders. Jesse rolls his weight into him. "What we did. You know you worked with me, right?" Jesse glances at him. "It's going to be okay." Gabriel strokes the side of his head. Jack watches Jesse's eyes. He's really fucking hard to read now. "We survived it, all right? I'm still watching out for you. I'll never stop that."

"We want to help," Jack says. Jesse's eyes rest on him, critically, and stay for a long while as Gabriel talks.


	14. Obscured

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clarity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please take a moment to review tags!

"Jesse," says Winston, "would you tell me why you want to keep the nanites like they are?"

Jesse's been allowed out of his room for more time each day, although Athena is keeping a close eye on him. He looks up from the window. "Sure. It's me."

Winston feels like this isn't a conversation he's ever had a chance to prepare for. "So's the part of your brain your brain can't reach. Neither of us know what's sealed off there, but it's still you."

"This is like I've been for as long as I can remember," Jesse says finally. Distantly. "Here I am with everyone expecting-" he clears his throat. "me to be different. Like they're all standing someplace waiting for me to catch up, and I don't even know why they're over there? This is me."  

Winston was right: this is outside his depth. "You don't know that you'll be any different. And moving things wear out. You have the choice right now, but eventually you might be looking at a lot of dead cells in there."

"Yeah." Jesse rests his head on the glass. "What did... Gabriel say?"

Winston looks up. "He's worried. He doesn't know how often Talon was maintaining the nanites. He said you had occasional painful injections that changed you for a little while, each time."

"Yeah."

"I don't know what they were or how to do that. And frankly, I wouldn't. I'm not going to push back against your brain healing from things they put in it."

Jesse pushes his hands against the glass. "Fine. Fuck. Fine, do what you want."

**

"Hey, Gabriel," Jack says. "You got a moment?"

Gabriel nods. Jack steps inside. The little fake-suite is a lot nicer than the padded rooms. Jesse looks up from his book as he sits curled in the corner. He's wearing leggings and a tight shirt, and Gabriel was just about to distract him from the book when Jack knocked.

"They want you to testify," says Jack.

"Testify to what?"

"Being unable to do things because of your experience," Jack says. "We can use the medical notes, but the lawyers are asking for actual impact on you. They don't want the big things, they're asking about the small things. The forgetting your name, the, what is it, verbal barrier you get on a mission? The forgetting everyone else's names? Hell, Jesse didn't like you did."

"What do you mean?" Gabriel asked.

"He used my full name, uh, before we captured him." Gabriel did not enjoy hearing about Jesse being shot. They avoid the topic.

Gabriel turns and looks at Jesse, who shrugs. "I'd just been through a pretty big experience," he says. "Must have jolted something out."

"The thing where I haven't seen you with a cigar since you got out?"  

"We don't smoke," Jesse says as Gabriel turns back.

"And that's wierd. Hell, Mercy's been after you to quit for-" Jack's expression goes suddenly, perfectly blank. He turns around and leaves. Jesse goes back to his book.

Gabriel is just about to browse the shelves when there's a chime on the door and Jack slams back in, barely contained rage in a long blue coat. He tosses Gabriel a cigar and a lighter. Jesse looks up again.

"We don't-" Gabriel starts.

"Yeah, I know." Jack is a clipped note off from barking orders. "Try it and then tell me."

Gabriel lights the cigar, puts it between his teeth, and breathes in deep. Holds it. Plumes it out slowly, eyes sliding shut in relief. A low-grade itch just cleared.

"I still don't want to testify," he says, handing back the lighter.

"Fine," Jack barks, and slams out the door again.

Jesse shakes his head and goes back to his book. Gabriel takes another few drags, walks over, and holds it out. Jesse reaches up, fingers closing around Gabriel's wrist firmly, and shoves it away.

**

He doesn't want to leave what he did. He resisted mind control, he fought back over time, he forced himself to think and remember and recover... whatever else he might have done in the time before he opened his eyes as Reaper, he fought and won for himself.

The idea that Mercy's resurrection could restore him, where it failed to save Faithbreaker, is dizzying. He could just wipe it all away, shed Talon's damage to his brain like a bad dream; maybe even recover all his memories, all those experiences, Overwatch, Blackwatch, the Crisis - all the shared jokes and all the things he's missing now.

Jesse is napping in his arms, tucked against his chest. That route's closed to him. They tested it, they know. Whatever happened to him, he's locked as he is, unless Winston's removal of the nanites is opening up freedoms in his skull he didn't know he had.

Gabriel can't just wipe Reaper from his mind, because Faithbreaker will be alone. Left behind, like he talked about. Like he fears. He hasn't said a damned word about what he wants, about the future. He's just stepped in beside Gabriel like that's the only place he could be.

"No one gets left behind," Gabriel says to the top of his head.

**

The trial is set. Then there is another lengthy argument over jurisdiction. Then the jurisdiction is changed. The lawyers grimly shred half the work they've completed.

Mercy pleas guilty. Jack is forced to go and discuss this with the judge. The problem, of course, is that Mercy has done actual medical miracles, and throwing her in a cell is a tremendous waste to humanity.

She's given a ban from any kind of brain surgery, experimental or not, without two colleagues supervising who are appointed by Overwatch. Then, she's placed in imprisonment for the remainder of her life, in Overwatch custody.

Jack gets very drunk for two days.

Gabriel says he can't believe it's over. Jesse says nothing.

**

"Do you feel different?" Winston asks Jesse.

"No," Jesse says. Gabriel glances over, wondering how it feels to have your brain tied together again, wonder if his memories are reconnecting. Being around the base, around Overwatch staff, being relaxed and not sent on missions, all of these things are relaxing Gabriel and letting him tap on the barrier in his mind.

Maybe he'll get his memories back without needing to leave Jesse feeling abandoned. Maybe he'll be able to keep his information on Talon that might keep them safe, voices and phrases, without having to worry about someone walking up and uncovering buried programming.

Jesse accomplishes something huge just by leaving his hair tie in his room one morning. People are relieved to see him just that little bit like he was. Gabriel finds he feels better just to have them all more relaxed. They don't need to fear Jesse. He's been calm since he was captured, hasn't offered a threat, tried to hurt anyone. He just falls in behind Gabriel, following his lead, like always.

**

"Any improvement?"

"For me," Gabriel asks Ana, "or him?"

"Either. Both."

"It's hard to say. I feel better, but I can't tell you why. Maybe it's just that I've been free this long. I can ask questions, I can go back over all that bullshit without feeling like my head's been broken into." Gabriel smiles.

"I was wondering why you seemed happier."

"Now, for him?"  Gabriel shrugs.  

"That boy's always had an excellent poker face." Ana hesitates. "How did you contact Talon when the missions were over?"

"Link in the mask," he answers, confused. That was a completely fucking random question. "Why?"

"One of the Talon researchers said ' _he knows how to reach us.'_ I've been wondering about that. At the time, it seemed like Jesse, but I thought it might have been you. I'll ask him about it."

"You want to pull the last researcher out of hiding."

"You know Talon. When they're attacked, they pull back, become hard to find. Later, they attack again from another direction. I am starting to wonder if I can bait him out before that happens."

"They wouldn't buy it," Gabriel says. "We've been here for too long. They have to know there's a reason we haven't left."

**

"I wish he were happier." Jack is watching Jesse sitting on the beach. They've taken time to come down to a small, uninhabitable tropical island. Gabriel and Jesse will be left here, for a few days. (There is nothing in their equipment that could be used to send a signal.)

"I know," Gabriel says.

Jesse seems smaller than Faithbreaker. Crushed. He doesn't have the swagger Gabriel sees on old videos before Talon took him, or the prowling langour that possessed Faithbreaker. He might have more of his brain back, but he's somehow smaller. He's missing Faithbreaker's fire.  He doesn't reach for Gabriel first, he doesn't work to outdo him on the days that Jack and Ana take him to the range. He's just quiet and passive.

"He's always been kind of a mystery to me," Jack goes on. "Hiding everything behind a drawl, a smile, and 'I'll take that to my commander.' I can't read him any better than I used to."

"Could Ana?"

Jack nods. "Most of the time."

They watch Jesse walk along the beach, looking for shells, looking terribly alone. It worries Gabriel.

**

Faithbreaker is just gone, like a mirage, Gabriel realizes.

It's been nearly a full year since the nanites have gone. Winston's cautioned him, has told him that people aren't jigsaws, they take time to integrate, re-integrate, and develop. Gabriel knows. But Jesse, as pale and passionless as he is, is still bone-deep loyal. There's a resolve to how closely he follows Gabriel that means he's still in there.

Faithful.

(Again. Like he was, once, loyal, Gabriel's devoted follower. Sometimes Gabriel remembers flickers.)

**

He's going to go through with it. He's going to wash away Reaper and go back to Gabriel. He's going to lose any hints of Talon, yes, but it's worth the tradeoff. If Faithbreaker is laid to rest, if they have Jesse now, he's grateful for the sacrifice - for all the sacrifices - but he can leave the shadows behind. He can step into the future, and try to pull Jesse towards him there, help him grow past the shadows and dark places.

(Maybe, he knows, they can't be like they were; their partnership isn't what it was. He doesn't want to leave him behind.)

It's perfect. He wants it like he wants a new day, like he wants clean water. There's only one thing that nags at him:

 _He knows how to reach us_ he hears in his head.

He doesn't. That's odd, because he knows the words to bring Jesse under Talon's refreshed control. He was the one who leads the way on missions. He's the one who got armor, who wasn't treated like he's disposable.

He's in the shower when it occurs to him:

Did Talon think Jesse was disposable?

He might not have had armor, but he was never sent on missions alone. Always with Gabriel there, watching out for him. Talon had to know that's where his priority was. After all, they had him hooked up with sensors every time Jesse came near. They paraded Jesse in stupid outfits and used the strength of Gabriel's reaction to wear him down. Afterward, when Gabriel was freed, they let Gabriel focus on covering him. They'd used his possessiveness. They'd kept people's eyes on Jesse because it drove Reaper crazy, kept him invested, kept him focused.

 _Hellbait._ It was their plan all along, from the moment they first took him, and it worked so well they never stopped. Jesse was never his partner on missions. He'd taken the bait, swallowed the hook. The concessions, the secrets Jesse kept... just slack in the line. If it had felt too tight, he'd have snapped it and swum off.

Gabriel sits down on the shower floor, letting the water drum on his skull, on his back.

They gave them busy work together. The days in King's Row, all the time on their own before and after missions - that was unmonitored, not because they trusted the programming, but because they knew they had Jesse.

 _Faithbreaker_. Someone they knew was constantly committing low-grade treachery against them; that was the plan, because he'd always bring Gabriel in, in the end. And - Faithbreaker had known Jack Morrison's full name. Maybe before, while Reaper was wandering King's Row. Maybe after their mission briefing, when Reaper was trying to remember Jack. Faithbreaker had kept a secret from him. 

The water taps cold on his head. Gabriel gets up, swatting it off. Brushes his teeth slowly, looking for another explanation. Why would Jesse (or Faithbreaker) be so still and obliging all this time? He's had a change in his brain; is he slowly coming back? What if he's giving up early? Panicking himself long before the changes have had a chance to kick in, before Jesse's brain has healed, before nerves have regrown to severed areas? 

He spits into the sink, rinses his mouth, and walks into the bedroom. Jesse's sprawled among the pillows. Gabriel flicks off the light and crawls into the sheets beside him. It's got to be wrong. How would he even know? How would he even find out? Everything's hidden inside Jesse's skull. Always has been, for as long as he can remember, for as long as Jack can remember.

He rolls over. "Faithbreaker," he murmurs, leaning in, kissing the side of Jesse's throat, just under his ear. "Wake up."

Jesse shifts. Sighs, sleepily. "Hah?"

"Hey. Faithbreaker." He puts more command in his voice. How would Reaper - he lets it fill his voice. Command, determination, shaded by love. " _Faithbreaker_."

Jesse rolls over lazily. Warm hands lift, one at the side of his face, one curling around the back of his neck. There's a yawn. No. That's a sigh of relief, long and deep. "You were... you were really startin' to scare me."

"Sorry," he drops his voice. Thank-

"I knew you wouldn't forget me." He hears a breathless little laugh. The hand behind his head tugs Gabriel down, foreheads together. Fingertips trace his mouth. "It's just - it's been so fucking long." A warm kiss is pressed against the side of Gabriel's mouth. "It time to go?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much, everyone, for reading.


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